Viljar Bøe shocked and delighted fans at FrightFest 2023 with the premiere of his deliciously warped cat-and-mouse horror film Good Boy. Two years on, the Norwegian director has returned to the UK's biggest horror film festival with his latest offering, Above The Knee, which is similarly not for the faint of heart. Deliciously twisted and utterly nerve-shredding, the film continues Bøe's winning streak of making audiences squirm throughout his films' excruciating runtimes.
Above The Knee follows Amir (Freddy Singh), who is harboring a dark secret. He is tormented by visions of his left leg rotting and longs to have it amputated as he believes it does not belong to him. He meticulously plans an “accident” that he will use as a cover for the loss of his leg, while removing it himself. While keeping this scheme secret from his girlfriend, Kim (Julie Abrahamsen), and longtime friend and new boss Jonas (Viggo Solomon), he meets Rikke (Louise Waage Anda), a woman who had recently gone public with her suffering from Body Integrity Disorder, which had led her to pretend to be blind.
Bøe's latest disturbing offering wastes no time immersing viewers in the warped world he has created, opening with an ominous shot of a mountain, a rock covered in blood, and Amir wrapping a belt around his leg while downing vodka. The entirety of Above The Knee feels like a nightmare you cannot wake from, with the mundanity of the sets, colour palette, and dialogue highlighting the sheer bizarreness of the plot. Bursts of gore and Amir's repulsive, rotting leg permeate the narrative and become increasingly frequent as Amir loses his grip on reality, with a countdown to his planned “accident” further heightening the suffocating tension.
Much of the horror of Above The Knee lies in the sheer cringe-inducing, awkward encounters Amir creates for himself as he tries to keep his morbid desire under wraps. Bøe's masterful grip on storytelling is evident in the way he layers lie upon lie and how they slowly tumble down around Amir, littering small details and throwaway comments throughout the narrative that culminate in one edge-of-your-seat, almost unbearable conclusion.
Despite the taboo topic at hand, Above The Knee maintains a sympathetic approach to Amir, never losing sight of the devastating toll his affliction has had on his mental health. Similar can be said of Rikke, who, despite Kim's chastising of her pretending to be blind and her increasingly obsessive behaviour over Amir, is a multi-faceted character that elicits sympathy as well as fear. Both Freddy Singh and Louise Waage Anda deliver jaw-dropping performances, commanding every scene they grace with their nuanced, sobering portrayals of their complex characters.
Above The Knee is a torturous experience from start to finish, and that's exactly why you will want to see it. Bøe pushes the limits of what we come to expect from body horror in this razor-sharp, awkward, and thoroughly engrossing shocker that is as thought-provoking as it is gnarly.
Above The Knee had its UK premiere at FrightFest 2025 on 25 August
