Open Wound

Man, I really wanted this one to be good. Hell, maybe it is. Open Wound makes some smart choices and some interesting choices. There’s some real potential here. But at the end of the film, it’s primarily an unsatisfying and frustrating watch and not remotely frightening.

Sara and Alisa are two high school best friends living in Serbia. Alisa has a boyfriend. Sara doesn’t. Sara writes Alisa a letter revealing her extremely strong feelings towards her. For Sara, her feelings are agony and her desire manifests as wanting Alisa to live beneath her skin and Sara wanting to suffocate beneath Alisa’s skin. This doesn’t go well. Alisa distances herself from Sara. Obviously, this doesn’t stop Sara’s feelings. Sara pines, until suddenly Alisa contacts her, suddenly up for more than friendship, provided Alisa disguise herself if they go out.

Most of this movie is a moody drama about unrequited love, especially in a still-homophobic society. The film is bleak and atmospheric, but not horrific. The choice to film in black and white really adds something. It adds additional mood, atmosphere and a feeling of bleakness. There’s really good use of light and shadow, and lots of very intentional and strong artistic shots. The artistic black and white adds a new dimension to a fairly simple story.

And then every once in a while, something horror-y happens. There’s a few additional dream sequences or moments, but I want to hone in on three. First, when Alisa reads Sara’s letter expressing her feelings. There’s a moment where Sara is depicted with a huge stomach, perhaps expressing her desire to have Alisa literally inside her, or perhaps some sort of representation of being literally full and pregnant with her feelings for Alisa. Then, there’s a scene where Sara sees some sort of goopy, infant creature near the sewers. Finally, the film concludes in a condemned building, and there’s a fucked up guy in there!

My interpretation of these scenes is that maybe they all represent Sara’s feelings. As she writes the letter, her feelings for Lisa reside only inside her, too big and uncomfortable but solely within herself. Later, she’s released those feelings into the world and experiences rejection. This is when she encounters some sort of abortion-looking creature, pathetic and unloved. Sara also ignores that creature, not rescuing or nurturing it, perhaps like she is trying to do with her crush. Finally, perhaps that fucking guy in the sewer is the maturation of feelings. Sara and Alisa have had sex. The crush has achieved maturity. And what better way to express the culmination of a lesbian crush than an eyeless mutant?

Of course, Mr. Mutant Manifestation may be a dream or at least, a figment of Sara’s troubled mind. I think it’s also possible my analysis is completely off. This is sort of the problem with Open Wound. These horror elements are too infrequent and don’t lead to a satisfactory third act. Hell, for a movie called Open Wound, there was a surprising lack of open wounds. These horror moments are well-shot and a cool idea; but they just do not come together for me. The eyeless mutant moment for example just made me laugh. A movie that’s mostly about the horror of unrequited feelings just suddenly having a fucking guy there overplayed its hand.

There’s some really interesting ideas in Open Wound. I like the idea of taking a lesbian crush to a place of surreal horror. The idea of feelings manifesting as some sort of body horror or developing creature? Potentially extremely cool. Open Wound just did not succeed in its execution, unfortunately. I really wanted it to, but the film ends on such a brief climax and then a scene which minimizes that climax. This is such a frustrating movie because I see how this could’ve been lesbian, Serbian Eraserhead. But in reality, it just did not come together and ended up pissing me off.

Overall rating: 3.5/10

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