Review by
Eric Hillis
Directed by: Mattias Skoglund
Starring: Philip Oros, Anki Lidén, Gizem Erdogan, Emil Brulin, Peter Jankert
Following the likes of Late Phases, The Manor and The Rule of Jenny Pen, director Mattias Skoglund's adaptation of Mats Strandberg's novel The Home is the latest horror movie to adopt a retirement home as its
central setting. It's the best of the bunch, as it does a fine job of
simultaneously mining both our fear of growing senile in our dotage and
our guilt around having to hand over a parent to the care of strangers
at the end of their life.
Joel (Philip Oros) finds himself in this position when his
mother, Monika (Anki Lidén), suffers a stroke and is no
longer able to take care of herself. Something of the black sheep of the
family, Joel returns to his childhood home to clear it out for sale. His
mother mistakes him for her other more successful son, Bjorn, who is
clearly her favourite. Joel's sad face bears a resigned look that
suggests he's long accepted his status in his family.
In the home, Monika finds herself menaced by a presence that both
mentally and physically abuses her while sometimes taking possession of
her body. While in this possessed state, Monika acts cruelly to those
around her, claiming she always thought the gay Joel would die of AIDS
and mocking the dementia of the other residents. Back in the family
home, Joel has a vision of his late father Bengt (Peter Jankert),
who made his life hell as a child and was physically abusive to Monika.
This convinces Joel that Bengt has somehow returned from the grave to
terrorise Monika once more.
The idea that a domestic abuser might return from the other side to
continue their reign of terror is one of the more unsettling notions
I've come across in the horror genre. Skoglund makes great use of the
respective vulnerabilities of Joel, often incapacitated by the drink and
drugs he uses to numb his trauma, and Monika, literally confined to a
bed and thus an easy target. With neither Joel nor Monika in much of a
state to defend themselves, a substitute heroine emerges in Joel's
childhood friend Nina (Gizem Erdogan), now a nurse at the
retirement home. There are hints that Nina is a victim of domestic abuse
of a psychological if not physical manner at the hands of her own
overbearing husband, Markus (Emil Brulin), who insists she stay
away from Joel. When the possessed Monika begins to mock Nina with
details of her life she couldn't possibly be privy to, Nina takes it
upon herself to battle Bengt. It's almost as if she takes on this fight
as a surrogate for the one the one she feels she lost long ago to
Markus.
Eschewing any sort of romantic will-they-won't-they questions, the
relationship between Joel and Nina feels fresh and nuanced. We get the
impression that the young gay man and the daughter of immigrants
initially bonded thanks to their feelings of being outsiders, and
they've now found themselves equally adrift as adults.
Skoglund avoids cheap scares, instead developing a sense of unease
largely based around feelings of guilt regarding how characters have
treated others and how they've allowed themselves to be treated by
others. The malevolent spirit of Bengt offers a chance for Joel and Nina
to finally lash out at a wider society that never gave them a
chance. The Home is about how we're forced to betray our elders and the ignorant
ideas they rigidly stick to if we're to advance as a progressive
society, but as its ambiguous final scenes seem to suggest, sometimes
the cruelty of the past refuses to die.
