The Innocents Review

9/10

There are very few films that feel genuinely unnerving. The kind that creeps under your skin and put you on edge. Most of the time they are psychological horror films. I was not expecting to have that kind of reaction to this film. The Innocents was written and direction by Eskil Vogt, most recently known as the co-writer of the Oscar nominated film The Worst Person in the World. He was also nominated for co-writing the screenplay. To go from a film like that to such a tonal shift was a pleasant surprise. I was not familiar with his work before this, beyond The Worst Person in the World. Now I am intrigued to check out his other work.

            The Innocents takes the well-worn story of characters discovering they have incredible powers and flips it by becoming a deeply unsettling character study. Rakel Lenora Fløttum plays Ida, a nine-year-old girl moving to a new apartment block with her parents and her sister Anna, a fantastic performance by Alva Brynsmo Ramstad. All the performances are wonderful, but Alva’s has incredible amounts of nuance. Her character is autistic and mostly non-verbal, so she must convey a hidden world via mannerisms and sounds. A difficult role to perfect, but she captures Anna with the finesse of a veteran actor. Her relationship with Ida is tumultuous from the start. Ida is first shown pinching her sister’s arm hard. Boundaries are clearly not a concept she is familiar with.

            The apartment block they move to reminded me of one of my favorite films, Let The Right One In, another film about the perils of childhood innocence. Ida is jealous of her sister receiving attention from their parents. The ways she torments her sister are uncomfortable to watch. She is still discovering the limits of what she can get away with and resents her sister for being the prime focus. After wandering the area, Ida soon meets Ben, a loner  boy who becomes her first new friend. This is where the film starts to introduce the supernatural element. Ben has psychic abilities that allow him to move objects. At first, this is shown in small ways. The extent of his powers is limited.

            Soon after this we meet Aisha, a young girl with enhanced empath abilities. She can feel the intense emotions and physical pain of others. More specifically, this manifests in her connection with Anna. The two have an immediate bond and are even able to communicate in their own way. This forms the backbone of the story, kids discovering their abilities and testing out what they can do. What makes the film great is the way it delves deep into the idea of nurture versus nature. Are some people destined to be evil and abuse their power no matter what? Are kids as innocent as they seem to be? The bond that forms between Ida, Aisha, Anna and Ben is genuine and brings them closer as their abilities become stronger. I want to compliment the other two child actors, Sam Ashraf, who plays Ben, and Mina Yasmin Bremseth Asheim, who plays Aisha. Child actors tend to overplay their roles. In many films they can be grating and come across as written by adults who have no idea how children speak.

            Here they feel like real kids. The way they speak, and act is not overdone in the slightest. Ben develops in a way that is different to the others. He has a neglectful homelife and lashes out more than the rest. He has only used his powers in isolation and never stretched their potency. Now, with friends to impress and a growing awareness of his strength, he starts using his powers in more nefarious ways. Kids learning they have powers has been done multiple times before. What makes The Innocents  superior to all the other attempts is its dedication to psychological exploration.

            There are multiple scenes in the film that will make many people uneasy. I usually don’t give trigger warnings, but there is a scene involving violence being carried out on a cat that made me a tad queasy. It is not a gruesome moment since the brutality is implied, but the idea of what is happening was stomach-churning. Some would argue the film becomes gratuitous in its portrayals of children. I entirely disagree with that. This is a heart wrenching and brutal film at times, but it is never excessive. Most of us will remember times where we pushed the limits of what we were allowed to do as kids. It takes a long to develop empathy and understanding when you’re under a certain age.

            I remember using my glasses to burn leaves in my backyard when I was with a friend. That was a silly and fun method of passing the time. One with no consequences beyond cruelty to foliage. There are those whose brains are wired in a more twisted way who would take these actions to a darker place. Most of us learn over the years to develop and comprehend what is and isn’t acceptable. If you had the powers these kids have, what would you have done with them when you were their age? It is easy for us to say in retrospect that we would use them just to play and not hurt anyone. That is the benefit of hindsight. Who knows how our minds could have warped if we grew up the way Ben did in the film?

            The one slight issue I had with the film is the way it shows one of Ben’s later abilities. Without getting into spoiler territory, he develops the ability to control people via a kind of mind manipulation. I won’t detail what he does with this newfound power. When these moments occur, they become hallucinogenic nightmares. The character being controlled is trapped in a kind of other realm where they see what Ben wants them to witness in order to make them do what he wants. These scenes are well made, but they could have been more expressive and vivid with their portrayal of this mind control world.

            The Innocents never loses track of its heart. That is key to what makes it such an effective film. Despite Ida’s initial indifference towards her sister, the two learn to understand for each other throughout the film. The connection these kids share grounds the more supernatural parts. I have seen some ask if this counts as a superhero film. While I get why people would ask that, to me that would be like asking if Carrie is a superhero film. I can see this becoming a favorite of 2022 for me. It brilliantly captures the pains of growing up and figuring out your identity and place in the world. .