By David Dent
Mattias Johansson Skoglund’s debut feature as sole director is a superbly atmospheric movie, where the horror is located both naturally and supernaturally.
Musician Joel (Philip Oros) is drawn back to his childhood home in Stockholm following his mother’s stroke and her subsequent move to the Ekskuggan care home. As much as mum Monika (Anki Lidén) struggles to adapt to her new surroundings, Joel is also in a dark place, his return triggering unhappy memories. For mother and son are united by a shared traumatic past, courtesy of Monika’s now dead husband Bengt (Peter Jankert) who was violent both to his wife and Joel.
Joel hopes that the presence of his childhood friend, care worker Nina (Gizem Erdogan) may ease his mother’s settling in, but Monika’s fears become more pronounced, taking shape in the form of a figure whose malevolence spreads across the establishment. When another care assistant, Olivia (Lily Wahlsteen) quits after a disturbing incident at Monika’s bedside (in which a shadow from the girl’s past returns to haunt her) Joel and Nina – who is facing her own relationship issues – fear that something otherworldly has taken root at Ekskuggan, which may be the spirit of Bengt.
Care home horror may be an emerging genre in a world with an ageing population; this year we’ve also had the institutional anxiety of James Ashcroft’s The Rule of Jenny Pen. It’s a subject matter that strikes at the heart of most people; one day this will be us. Skoglund’s film cleverly interweaves the despair of end of days care (although the residents of this particular facility all seem more crazy than senile) and the threat of male violence, both on this earth and beyond it. It’s not an easy watch but an at times frightening one.
Hemmet (The Home) screened as part of SXSW Film Festival 2025.
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