SUNDANCE 2024: Grief Weighs Heavy In ‘Handling the Undead’

Horror doesn’t always have to be loud and brash. It can come in quietly, falling over you like a fog. The quietness of human grief is its own trauma and horror, and capturing its multitudes is rife for storytelling. Handling the Dead (Hanteringen av odöda) takes on this challenge as it explores grief through a horror staple: zombies.

Based on the book by John Ajvide Lindqvist, Handling the Dead takes place in Oslo on a hot summer day as the dead rise. Told from the perspective of three families, Handling the Dead unpacks each one’s loss when their loved ones are returned to them. Instead of focusing on the gruesome nature of the undead, the film is more concerned with what it means for desperate families when their loved ones come back.

Every character in Handling the Undead is passing through their grief or standing still in their own unique ways. Grief is not linear, and it’s not the same for everyone. In each of the representations, the audience is hollowed out. Accepting the death of the loved ones sitting in front of them is a process, some slower than others. Watching every character handle their undead is upsetting, uncomfortable, and, for those who have recently lost loved ones, sure to rub your nerves raw. It’s beautiful. Handling the Undead is able to find beauty and pain in the uncomfortable space of grief. The film crawls into the cavern left by loss and sits in it, pulling you further down.

Handling the Undead is a zombie film that puts the human before the spectacle. The horror of the film is the way that grief rips you apart, not how zombies do. This is built through action, not words. Instead of relying on heavy dialogue, the film uses something more visceral, showing the audience how each character reacts to their grief. This puts an enormous weight on the actors, and each one carries it extraordinarily well.

The two performances, however, that stand out the most are Renate Reinsve and Bente Børsum as Anna and Eva, respectively. Anna is a mother handling the loss of her son. When he returns, she sits on his bed, and the camera closes in on her face. Tears are streaming down her face as she oscillates between a smile and a pained grimace. The deteriorating body of her son is there. Elias is in front of her. But in one moment without words, Reinsve captures the pain of a mother seeing her grief made real. She is happy, scared, and hollow all at the same time.

For Børsum’s part, we see Eva get her partner (Olga Damani) ready one last time. She washes her, dresses her, and applies her makeup. It’s intimate and somber. Everything about seeing these two lovers together again with the knowledge that one may not be truly there is painful in the highest order. The film builds its drama and trauma in thin layers of intimate moments as every family desperately wants to be whole again.

Handling the Dead is a horror film, but it’s one that invests time in how terrifying and unsettling grief can be. Does a body mean more than a memory? Is letting go a second death or simply an understanding of the first? There is no clear answer, with each character taking their own path through their pain. That’s what makes it painfully impactful.

Handling the Undead screened as a part of Sundance 2024 and is set for distribution from NEON.