Sundance: Knocking

Starring: Cecilia Milocco, Albin Grenholm, Ville Virtanen, Krister Kern, Alexander Salzberger, Charlotta Åkerblom

Director: Frida Kempff

Molly (Cecilia Milocco) is attempting to return to every day life after suffering a mental breakdown due to the unexpected death of her partner. After moving into a new apartment, she not only begins to hear a strange knocking coming from above her but an odd stain is slowly forming on her ceiling and she hears screaming coming through the walls of her bathroom. But when she begins to ask her neighbors about the knocking, no one knows what she is talking about. After the knocking continues, Molly's grip on reality slips further and further away as she becomes convinced that her neighbors are hiding something. What are they hiding, if anything? Is the knocking real or in Molly's head?

Based on Johan Theorin's novel "Knocks," Kempff's narrative debut is an intriguing look at gaslighting told through from the female perspective. It's a strong premise that Kempff films incredibly well for what feels like an incredibly low budget. Shot in only 18 days, Kempff and her cinematographer Hannes Krantz do a fantastic job of building atmosphere from the beginning. This culminates in a long take involving a very determined Molly storming through the apartment complex searching for what she thinks is the truth. A camera was strapped to the the actress Milocco so that we get a very disorienting effect of just seeing her face and blurry images around her as she tears through hallways and rooms. It's very effective and is easily the best sequence in the film.

It's unfortunate then that the movie doesn't fully capitalize on its premise, often feeling like it is spinning its wheels until its wild final few minutes. Don't get me wrong, things happen, but it never really feels like it's advancing the plot much. For a movie that runs only seventy eight minutes (credits included), that's not a good thing.

It all builds to a narrative altering ending, revealing something that changes your perspective on everything that came before it. There are many different ways to interpret the ending and each different way you think about it raises so many interesting questions that you'll want to rewatch just to see how it all fits together. Some might find it frustrating that it poses more questions without answering some of the ones it had posed earlier, and this has bothered me before as well, but I wasn't as bothered here. At least it swung for the fences. I'm not even sure that it would all make complete sense on a rewatch but I am actually ok with that.

I haven't even gotten to mention Milocco's fantastic lead performance. Regardless of your interpretation on the film, Molly is incredibly sympathetic, not just because of what happened in her past but because she just wants to help because she thinks someone might be getting hurt. Milocco's performance gets better and better as Molly's frustration grows and she keeps you invested even though the surrounding story may not.

While it doesn't fully capitalize on its premise, the conversation the ending inspires make this Swedish thriller worth a watch.

Grade: C+