In Copenhagen, after the First World War, Karoline toils in a factory. Living in abject poverty, she believes her future is assured when she begins an affair with her rich boss. Alas, Karoline quickly finds herself in even greater poverty, unemployed and, moreover, pregnant. It is during this period of extreme vulnerability that this fictional heroine crosses paths with a very real historical figure: Dagmar Overbye, a serial killer of infants. Co-written and directed by Magnus von Horn, The young woman with the needle is an ambitious period film, says the filmmaker.
“I was originally approached to make a film that would be about Dagmar Overbye: in Denmark, everyone knows who it is, but for my part, I didn't know her at all,” admits the director Swedish during a videoconference interview.
The proposal came at just the right time, since Magnus von Horn really wanted to make a horror film. In this regard, the crimes of Dagmar Overbye constituted a truly horrific matrix.
And in fact, reading about the murderess gave Magnus von Horn a chill down his spine. In this case, all these infanticides perpetrated resonated within him in a very intimate way.
“Like many parents, I have always felt this visceral fear that something would happen to my children. Additionally, at the time of the film's development, five years ago, my second child had just been born. This means that even as I held this fragile newborn close to me every day, I read these things which filled me with fear. »
Travel in time
However, as the filmmaker confides, fear is for him the best creative engine there is, especially for a horror film.
“When I talk about a horror film, I specify that I didn't want to make a genre film as such, but rather to use horror and see where it would take me. That's what I did, and it grew and grew and went in all kinds of directions. »
Magnus von Horn quickly decided that his film would be in black and white. There was a specific reason for this, linked to a concern for authenticity.
“Everything we know about this era – the photographs, the films – is in black and white. What we wanted to do with my director of photography [Michał Dymek]it was to transport the audience on a credible journey through time; take the audience to a specific place in History, and make this place believable. And we wanted to make this world interesting and attractive. Often, when I watch historical dramas or costume films, I don't believe the image that is presented to me. To me it looks like an elementary school play, with boys wearing mustaches and girls wearing big ball gowns. It doesn't sound right. »
How can you avoid falling into this trap?
“In order to avoid resorting to this treatment, I had to be ambitious. Consequently, I had to be inspired, logically, by ambitious productions, like Schindler’s List [La liste de Schindler]one of the rare films, in my opinion, that really succeeds in taking us back in time. »
All-round complexity
Another choice that emerged early on was to take a certain distance from Dagmar Overbye, although it had initially been the reason for the project. Magnus von Horn and his co-writer, Line Langebek Knudsen, thus wanted to embrace a more overtly sociopolitical perspective.
“We felt pretty quickly that we didn't want to make a serial killer the main character. We preferred to use what she did in a way that examined the society in which she lived. Because her actions say a lot about the time, about the situation of women at the time. And so, by zooming out on these horrible crimes, you discover this whole world… A particular context in which women came to give their child to Dagmar. We said to ourselves that it would be more interesting to imagine a fictional main character, this woman who is inexorably pushed towards Dagmar. What makes Karoline want to believe in Dagmar before finally discovering the horrible truth? »
To pursue Magnus von Horn, the evil encountered in The young woman with the needle has complex social causes. This last qualifier also applies to the protagonist, Karoline.
“I never wanted to make my main character a passive victim. In order to be an interesting main character, Karoline always had to be active in this succession of choices that put her in difficult situations. Even this boss-employee relationship that she gets into, she plays an active role in it, which was very important to me. Otherwise, I would have lost interest in her, because she would have become a sort of passive victim. The plot is only interesting to the extent that the main character is interesting and actively participates in his destiny. And that’s also what makes the story uncomfortable and provocative and nuanced, as human beings are. »
