“Midsommar” sounds like IKEA to many of us. And frankly, that’s what the movie by horror kid wonder Ari Aster, who also brought us the grandiose “Hereditary,” looks like: Like something out of an IKEA catalog full of happy smiling people celebrating a big summer party in traditional Swedish costumes.
Some of them just smile in satisfaction at first, but Aster consistently pulls through another special feature and delivers with it a bombshell surprise in the horror genre, which is often quite worn: most of his “Midsommar” takes place in the blazing daylight, it is almost always and everywhere light, after all it is midsummer, it just doesn’t get really dark. So no teens in dark woods, no orgies of butchers at midnight.
The best horror movie of at least 2019
Does that make Midsommar less scary? Absolutely not! The horror actually ramps up because everything seems so happy and bright, radiant and inviting, but it is precisely in this setting that one of the most thrilling, mysterious and insane horror stories of recent years takes place – with absolute certainty “Midsommar” is for me the best horror movie of 2019, maybe even of the decade.
One scene in particular at the very beginning, not yet set in sun-drenched Sweden, ripped the carpet right out from under my feet in the cinema – but before I get into that (with spoiler warning!), here’s a brief plot summary for that anyone who doesn’t know about “Midsommar” yet. And if that’s the case, you need to change that ASAP!
This is possible, for example, on June 24, 2023, when “Midsommar” can be seen on ServusTV from 10:30 p.m. (the channel is expected to stop in Germany at the end of this year). Or you can watch it with an Amazon Prime Video subscription or on Blu-ray or DVD – also in the Director’s Cut, which is 23 minutes longer:
The plot: Anthropology PhD student Christian (Jack Reynor) and his girlfriend Dani (awesome: Florence Pugh) haven’t been happy in a while, but a trip to Sweden together should help and especially bring Dani, who has been heartbroken since a family. drama, to other thoughts. Another plus of the trip: Christian hopes to finally find a suitable topic for his dissertation by attending a very special Midsommar ritual that takes place only once every 90 years in a friend’s home village.
Once there, the festivities begin with shroom throwing. But the bizarre trip that the couple and their friends Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren), Josh (William Jackson Harper) and Mark (Will Poulter) then experience is nothing compared to the horror – no longer just psychedelic – they want to slide into. the next few days…
So beautiful and yet so terrible
I don’t really want to reveal too much, because “Midsommar” thrives on surprises – not through classic horror elements such as jump scares, of which there are only a manageable number, but through the mysteriously disturbing and sometimes utterly surreal situationsinto which Dani and Christian gradually end up.
I wasn’t the only one who sometimes laughed at the cinema – and not just because of the dry humor that shines through time and time again in the film. But rather out of sheer disbelief at what is just fucking and absurd that is happening before my very eyes.
“Midsommar” combines a psycho trip with cult horror, is beautifully photographed and gives the audience one punch after another in the stomach in an ever faster rhythm, as the Midsommar festivities reach their peak. And the blow is rarely one of sheer disgust or fear – but an emotional one, which is usually even nastier.
Especially in the aforementioned scene at the beginning of the movie, which is now at least partially revealed for the particularly curious – Attention, minor spoiler: Dani has been trying to reach her mentally unstable sister for some time now, from whom she recently received very disturbing messages. Even her parents, with whom Dani’s sister lives, can’t get her on the phone. After a long radio silence, Dani’s mobile phone rings and the viewer can already imagine what’s to come: bad news.
But the way Ari Aster directed the scene, which shows the audience what Dani just found out about her family over the phone (which, again, we don’t hear – we just see, and that’s bad enough), is absolutely masterful , or, as the reviews say – author Christoph Petersen called “almost perversely effective”. But here’s the real thing: see for yourself!