A contender for Palme d’Or at the Cannes, Swedish director Magnus von Horn’s film is centred on Dagmar Johanne Amalie Overby, who was convicted of murdering nine newborn babies between 1913 and 1920
Sometimes the most macabre movies remain etched in the mind’s eye, and the recent Cannes Film Festival contender for the Palme d’Or, Magnus von Horn’s The Girl With the Needle, is a classic example. I walked into the auditorium at Cannes, which I have covered for 30 years, with a clear understanding of what I was likely to encounter. However, the images that unfolded before me shook me up considerably even though I am accustomed to blood, gore, and the most unpleasant scenes as a critic.
In stark black and white, The Girl With the Needle, set in Copenhagen in the aftermath of the World War I, begins with the faces of the most grotesque kind. Helmed by Horn, a Swede who has made Poland his home, the work is a true story of a baby killer who lived in Denmark during 1921 — a Europe that lay shattered after World War I (1914-18). What I saw on the large screen was sheer hypnotic horror, a kind of crime that was unimaginably vicious and gory to the core. But yes, much like the Master of the Macabre, Alfred Hitchcock, Von Horn keeps the horrific and the dastardly below the carpet. It is subtle, it is stylishly mounted and performed with panache.
The Story of a Danish Serial Killer
Von Horn is a Cannes veteran. His sophomore Polish feature Sweat — starring Magdalena Koleśnik as Sylwia, it’s the story of a Polish social media fitness influencer’s quest for intimacy — was part of the Official Selection at the Festival in 2020. Earlier, in 2015, his Swedish debut feature, Intruz (The Here After), played in the Director’s Fortnight — a sidebar that runs along with the main Festival — at the Cannes. It roped in Vic Carmen Sonne and Trine Dyrholm to portray one of Denmark’s most notorious homicide cases. The movie focuses on people living precariously on the margins. One might liken it to a fairytale, albeit a dark and depressing one. Despite a good friend’s warning before I stepped into the theatre, I still found myself unprepared for its impact.
Dyrholm essays Dagmar Johanne Amalie Overby, a real-life Danish serial killer, who was eventually convicted of murdering nine newborn babies between 1913 and 1920. Ghastly as it may sound, one of them was her own. The rest came from unwed mothers, who naively believed that she was finding foster families for their children. The Girl With the Needle also follows a young woman, Karoline (Sonne), a seamstress in a factory where uniforms are made for soldiers. She falls in love with the factory owner, lonely as she is with her husband missing in action. When she runs into Dagmar in a bathhouse (where she is trying to abort her child with a needle), a bond is forged between them. And the younger woman gives birth and hands her baby over to Dagmar, hoping her child will find a safe, loving home. “You have done the right thing,” Dagmar tells Karoline and also the other mothers who seek help in finding foster parents.
Not quite a fairytale
Although the plot weaves in and out like a fairytale, it is not quite that. The factory owner, Jorgen (Joachim Fjelstrup), initially seems head-over-heels in love with Karoline, but his mother is vile and villainous. She puts an end to the romance and throws the girl out on the streets. In the meantime, Karoline’s heavily disfigured husband, Peter (Besir Zeciri), appears, and she struggles to accept a man who becomes a source of ridicule in the community, realizing his only income could come from playing a freak in a travelling circus.
Van Horn and his co-writer, Line Langebek Knudsen, walk a tightrope, balancing the horrific truth with fiction in what feels like a docu-drama. Jagna Dobesz’s sets, especially Karoline’s attic room filled with bird droppings, underscore the pain and pathos of a girl caught between a fleeting illusion ((when Jorgen walks into her life) and sheer disillusionment. Adding to the masterful storytelling are first-rate performances. Dyrholm is fantastic, epitomizing villainy while portraying Dagmar with a sincerity and sympathy that most will fall for, cleverly hiding the evil inside.
Sonne skillfully navigates Karoline’s journey through its highs and lows. Her genuine concern for the babies is palpable as she feeds them before they are taken away. The story is stark and compelling, but one question remains: why does Dagmar murder the babies when she could have found homes for them? Is she a serial killer, or is she suffering from some form of lunacy? The film leaves this crucial question unanswered.
