It's not often that we come across a movie about a serial killer that not only makes you deeply reflect on existence, morality, empathy, and parenthood but also the extraordinary filmmaking craft that went into it. The Girl with the Needle, streaming on Mubi, is a Danish serial killer movie that doesn't follow the usual tropes associated with the genre.
Of course, we are eventually introduced to this dreadful woman named Dagmar Overby, on whom this movie is based, but instead of making her the central character, director Magnus Von Horn opens his story with another woman, Karoline (Vic Carmen Sonne), who works as a seamstress at a factory run by a wealthy man. And von Horn takes his time establishing this character so well that you begin wondering if we'll ever get to the real-life incident. But it all makes sense much later, and you tell yourself: Wow! That is indeed a fresh idea.
From the outset, Von Horn introduces us to a harsh, haunting world characterised by dirt, grime, and squalor. I couldn't help but think of Crime and Punishment — not just because it evokes similar settings, but how the opening scene of the main character being asked to vacate her room on account of her being far behind on her rent, evokes the mood of the opening in the Dostoevsky novel. The choice to shoot this film in stunning monochrome is a great one due to the intensity of the subject matter. After all, we are dealing with characters living on the fringe, whose world is devoid of colour.
We can also see a strong influence of German expressionist cinema in the overall aesthetic of The Girl with the Needle, which employs photographic effects and light to create unsettlingly distorted versions of these characters' faces. Those familiar with films such as The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, The Testament of Dr. Mabuse, Metropolis, M, or The Passion of Joan of Arc will notice visual similarities. Be it the main character, Karoline, or any of the characters she comes into contact with, everyone's face tells a story that suggests they endured long periods of trauma, either from war, abuse or any other form of deeply humiliating misfortune.
These characters are often photographed in a way that places them in the middle of imposing columns of buildings, giving the impression of these characters being constrained by their surroundings. Sometimes, this impression is created with thick shadows, used at other times to make one or more characters appear chillingly sinister.
The German Expressionism influence becomes more evident when remembering the World War I period in which The Girl with the Needle is set. In the silent cinema era, filmmakers like Fritz Lang and F. W. Murnau made films that foretold the impending doom of World War II and Nazi Germany and were amplified by a singularly subjective point-of-view, placing us in the mind of their characters — an approach that marks The Girl with the Needle as well.
Despite the impressive use of black-and-white, von Horn doesn't resort to painting even its most evil characters in black and white. For instance, the woman who killed many babies tells the court that she should be given a medal for having the courage to do what many mothers are scared to do. She is driven by the deep conviction that she is doing the world and the babies a favour.
In one scene, she tells the protagonist that the world is miserable, but they must make themselves believe it isn't. There seems to be a suggestion that Dagmar Overby must've once been a discarded and abused child herself, which possibly shaped her into the monster that she later became.
While on monsters, the film brilliantly toys with the notion of what a 'monster' or 'freak' is, in different places. It demonstrates some interesting parallels, such as Karoline's husband who was disfigured in the war or the two separate instances of a mother being rude to her child — one involving a little girl who is slapped by her mother and another where a grown-up man is told by his affluent mother that he would be disowned if he went ahead and married one of his factory workers.
But for all its extreme cynicism, blood-curdling screams of babies, and the various unseen and implied horrors, the film ends on a hopeful note, a scene that leaves us with a smile on our faces. The world is not all that bad, after all, and you begin to realise there is a reason why its director chose not to make the serial killer the central character.
Denmark has been making some of the world's most hard-hitting films, and The Girl with the Needle joins the list of the best ones. It's the perfect example of one where every filmmaking department works together in perfect unison.
Film: The Girl with the Needle
Director: Magnus von Horn
Cast: Vic Carmen Sonne, Trine Dyrholm, Besir Zeciri, Joachim Fjelstrup
Rating: 4.5/5
