Movies - TV
Christian Tafdrup Knew Speak No Evil Would Draw Comparisons To Funny Games
By BJ COLANGELO
Christian Tafdrup’s psychological horror film “Speak No Evil” follows a family fighting for their lives after accepting an invitation to join a newly befriended family for a holiday weekend. Despite all the warning signs, the family still wants to appear as gracious guests, a convention of human interactions Tafdrup wanted to highlight, drawing inspiration from Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games.”
The director shared, “We talked about ‘Funny Games,’ by Michael Haneke, who also uses horror in a realistic way”; however, unlike “Speak No Evil,” the danger in Haneke’s film quickly becomes apparent. Tafdrup’s film was devised to leave the audience guessing whether the family was misreading the situation or if something sinister was actually at play.
“Speak No Evil” uses the realistic horror shared with “Funny Games” for a deep exploration of social conventions while creating a suspenseful, dark atmosphere. Tafdrup explained, “It was a balance between keeping it subtle but creating the sensation of characters going to a bad place without knowing where, why, and when” — a format that delivers a truly devastating experience.