Psalm 21

Introduction

Sweden is fast becoming a fashionable place in the world of literature and film making. Stieg Larrson's Millenium trilogy and Thomas Alfredson's vampire flick Let The Right One In have essentially put Sweden centre stage for their time in the sun, and Psalm 21 is a Swedish horror film that attempts to share some of that limelight. Fredrick Hiller's film even shares the same kind of time lag as the film series of The Millenium Trilogy, released now a nearly 2 years after filming. Could it have the same kind of effect that Alfredson's film had?

Henrik (Jonas Malmsjö) is a popular priest in his Stockholm parish who has been having recurring nightmares about his dead mother. On top of this, he is struggling to have a meaningful relationship with his son, who lives with his ex-wife and new husband. After a very trying day and evening unsuccessfully bonding with his son on his birthday, Henrik gets a phonecall from the coroner in Hammerdal. His father, who was the local priest, has been found dead - drowned in a local lake. Henrik hasn't seen his father since he was a boy, having been divorced from Henrik's mother and moving to the desolate village of Borgvattnet. Henrik finds both the phonecall and circumstances of his father's death very suspicious and, despite the warnings from his girlfriend, he sets off late at night for the village in which his father died.

Almost as soon as he reaches the area, travelling down a dirt track country road through thick forestry, he finds strange things happening. First he thinks he has run over one of his own parishioners, which turns out to be an hallucination of sorts, but bizzarely also leads to his car stalling and unable to restart. Henrik decides to walk on the 7 kilometres to the town but is slightly disturbed by strange and insistent noises around him, and so is more than happy to suddenly see a lit barn nearby. Investigating cautiously he finds a young girl in the barn, which confuses him as it's now the dead of night. Still, he'd rather be confused than shocked, as her facial features start to rot before his eyes. Unable to stop screaming, he attracts the attention of the main house and almost finds himself full of shotgun pellets. Almost...

The house is occupied by the Lidman family who offer him a bed for the night. The Lidman's have two children, a young, beautiful daughter called Nora and a rather hostile elder son in Olle, who appears to have studied under Henrik's father. There's something not quite right about the Lidman family and on top of this, Henrik's hallucinations get more and more vivid. As Henrik's fledgling relationship with the family who have put him up gets ever more strained, Henrik starts to believe that his father has been murdered - something almost positively encouraged by Olle, who seems to detest his family despite still living with them.

As Henrik's investigations dig deeper and his hallucinations seem to become much more frequent and real, Henrik finds that the answers may just be found in his childhood and could explain the reason why his mother is haunting him in his dreams...

Picture

I don't really have that much to say about the picture other than I really liked the deft touch the director has with his 'memory' shots of Henrik with his mother. They're much softer focus and also grainy and scratched, rather like old family holiday films. That's a nice, original touch - I've not seen that done elsewhere before.

Extras

VFX Breakdown - a nice little featurette showing how they pulled off the quite impressive CG special effects.

Overall

Despite being quite an impressive film in parts, I suspect that Psalm 21 will not take off in quite the same way as some of its contemporaries. The main reason for this is that the style of the film is one that played itself out about a decade ago, when there was a spate of religious horror films. There are two main themes to this film that actually cause conflict with each other. The first is that in 1983 the Swedish church decided that there was no such place as Hell, something to maybe cheer up the average parishioner and convince them that nothing bad would ever happen to them. The other is based around the guilt of long buried hidden memories of horrific childhood events, a tried and trusted film plot. Sadly the religious imagery and the shock tactics of over utilising the SFX does get to grate a bit in the end.

That's not to say the acting is not top notch, because it is. And this isn't surprising really as all of the cast have an established background in theatre. Jonas Malmsjö gives it his all in the lead role, giving his almost his complete acting range during the duration of the film, his character on edge and losing his faith all the way through the film. The only really undignified bit for him is the slow motion running, but to be fair that's down to the director. Almost stealing the show is Per Ragnar as Henrik's dead father, effortlessly giving an air of extreme malevolence in his short time on screen.

I did quite enjoy this film although it was also a little confusing with the dual themes. It tries both to be a horror and a thriller of sorts, and sadly doesn't quite hit the mark with either. In truth, Hiller should have chosen a direction and stuck to it as there really is enough within the script to have evolved further in either direction. As it is, he didn't quite expand upon either idea enough make this more memorable. The film has a bit of a false ending as well that is well telegraphed and again the religious iconry is pushed in your face as the obvious religious message is thrown directly at you, and then in a more direct way not long after.

I also got a little lost during the film not really knowing what was real and what wasn't, was Henrik actually hallucinating his way through this film as if on a bad LSD trip? It's not clear really. In the end only the acting stops this from becoming a rather mediocre re-tread of similar films from time past.