Direction: Lucile Hadzihalilovic
Country: UK / France / Belgium
This haunting, imminently methodic exercise directed by Lucile Hadzihalilovic is replete with pathos and stoic silences. A thread of disquietness infiltrates every pore of our skin while watching a taciturn, solitary middle-aged caretaker (Paul Hilton in an outstanding performance) employed to house-sitting a 10-year-old girl (Romane Hemelaers) in need of special dental care.
The French director of Bosnian descent rubbed elbows with Geoff Cox (High Life, 2018) in the script, adapting Brian Catling’s beautifully written novel with dreamlike realism. Following the 2015 horror thriller film Evolution, this was the second time they worked together.
From the very first minutes, we are captive to the bizarre enchantment of a psychological drama, whose style goes hand in hand with some deliberate narrative cloudiness. Occasionally erratic, it's still rewarding, with the abstruse tones and noir tinges evoking the worlds of Kafka, Murnau, Von Trier, and Borges.
The early moments, slow but never discouraging, force one to search for more than what the eyes are seeing. It takes 24 minutes for the first line to be said, and then the ambiguity gradually dissipates until a final scene that, being so sad and ferocious, made me realize this wasn’t a passive viewing experience.
Portending great things for the director, Earwig is somber and quiet, a canvas exquisitely painted with the talents of cinematographer Jonathan Ricquebourg (The Death of Louis XIV, 2016; Still Life, 2016), and with something undeniably effective about its creepiest moments.
