The Girl With the Needle (Movie)

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    12 New Movies Our Critics Are Talking About This Week

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    Whether you’re a casual moviegoer or an avid buff, our reviewers think these films are worth knowing about.The dog days of motherhood.Amy Adams channels her feral side in “Nightbitch,” directed by Marielle Heller.Searchlight Pictures‘Nightbitch’Amy Adams stars as a stay-at-home mother who turns into a feral dog in this adaptation of Rachel Yoder’s novel directed by Marielle Heller.From our review:The movie doesn’t need to convince its target audience that there’s something gravely wrong with contemporary American motherhood. … Every thinking woman who watches “Nightbitch,” and a fair share of men, too, already know that score. Given this, it’s frustrating how eager to please the movie is.In theaters. Read the full review.Critic’s PickGoing out with a bang (and a song).Tilda Swinton in “The End.”Felix Dickinson/Neon‘The End’This musical directed by Joshua Oppenheimer follows a well-off family (led by Michael Shannon and Tilda Swinton) in their lavish underground bunker as the world literally burns above them.From our review:“The End” is about one version of the end of the world, and about how the people who could have prevented it might feel when they get there. But to watch it is to think about yourself, at least if you have a conscience, and to ponder the sort of cognitive dissonance you live with every day.In theaters. Read the full review.Critic’s PickTwo sisters in a singular drama.Marianne Jean-Baptiste, left, and Michele Austin play polar-opposite sisters in “Hard Truths,” directed by Mike Leigh.Simon Mein/Thin Man Films Ltd, via Bleecker Street‘Hard Truths’The latest from the writer-director Mike Leigh centers on two sisters, Pansy (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) and Chantelle (Michele Austin), who have vastly different dispositions and outlooks on life.From our review:Leigh doesn’t put his characters on the couch or disgorge the traumas that are etched in every word and gesture. He doesn’t smooth any edges, express his views on race and class, nature and nurture, or float theories as to why Pansy seems so damaged while Chantelle shoulders life with grace. Instead, with deep feeling and lacerating and gentle words, Leigh creates a world that, like the vast, mysterious one hovering outside its frame, can seem agonizingly empty if you can’t see the people in it.In theaters. Read the full review.Critic’s PickRichard Gere and Jacob Elordi in confessional mode.Richard Gere in “Oh, Canada.”Kino LorberWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      ‘The Girl With the Needle’ Review: A Series of Unfortunate Events

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      This grim and exceptionally stylish film centers on a Danish woman who becomes tied up in the black-market baby trade.A couple of times in “The Girl With the Needle,” a grim story of a woman out of options, the director Magnus von Horn positions his camera in front of a mass of textile workers streaming out of the mill after their shifts. The moments pay homage to one of history’s first motion pictures, a Lumière film of employees leaving a factory.If that early cinematic curiosity captured reality, von Horn’s piercing black-and-white film elevates it, filling its world with figures and places out of a Gothic fairy tale. Set in post-World War I Copenhagen, the story, inspired by true events, follows Karoline (a remarkable, often wordless Vic Carmen Sonne) as she finds herself in a series of spaces — grubby tenements, factory floors, a utilitarian bathhouse, a circus sideshow — connected only by a menacing mood and a winding maze of steep cobblestone streets.The plot is a series of unfortunate events, with Karoline becoming pregnant by her boss only to be frozen out by his mother and fired from her job. At the same time, her husband, assumed to be dead, returns home from the war with his face disfigured. It’s a strong start for a story about how, amid hardship and desperation, compassion can wear thin.But once the story veers into a local woman’s black-market adoption scheme, Karoline’s personal troubles are eclipsed by a greater evil — the details of which inspired the screenplay. These events scandalize, yet “The Girl With the Needle” is most intriguing when it lingers in its disturbing fictions, which come to life with exceptional style.The Girl With the NeedleNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 55 minutes. In theaters. More

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      When a Baby Killer Isn’t a Straightforward Villain

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      The real-life murderer who inspired “The Girl With the Needle” was “a monster,” said the actress who plays her, “but the movie is also about showing you her struggles.”In 1920s Copenhagen, a woman named Dagmar Overbye was convicted of murdering multiple infants whose mothers had paid her to find adoptive families for them. She confessed to killing 16 babies, though the true number of victims was likely higher.One of Denmark’s most notorious serial killers, Overbye is a character in the movie “The Girl with the Needle,” which arrives in U.S. theaters on Friday and is Denmark’s entry for the best international feature Oscar.Yet the film isn’t a true-crime thriller, and Overbye isn’t portrayed as a straightforward villain. Instead the story is about “finding the humanity in these horrible deeds,” the film’s director, Magnus von Horn, said in a video interview — a tall task considering the deeds involve burning, drowning and strangling babies.How to perform the high-wire act of humanizing a killer?“You focus on the characters,” von Horn said.And you have to cast actors fearless enough to pull it off.Enter Trine Dyrholm and Vic Carmen Sonne, the two leads in “The Girl with the Needle,” and two of Denmark’s most boundary-pushing actors.The movie is based on the story of Dagmar Overbye, one of Denmark’s most notorious serial killers.MubiWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More