“A film in which ambiguity is a design flaw rather than a narrative feature.”

There is a long and storied tradition of cinema fascinated by the allure of transgression and the dangers lurking beneath polished, respectable surfaces, particularly in those places in which we don’t normally find acts of social defiance or moral rot. Night Nurse, the directorial debut of Georgia Bernstein, clearly positions itself within this canon of films, but struggles to justify its fixation with some of its core ideas. The film is set within a retirement community, and the protagonist is Eleni, who has recently been hired as a night nurse. What she imagines will be simply caring for the frail elderly residents takes a darker turn when she meets Douglas, who is supposedly experiencing severe mental decline, but in reality is only masquerading as a feeble old man, using his presence in this home as a means to manipulate others for his personal gain. It isn’t long before Eleni falls under his spell, leading to a passionate but terrifying game of cat-and-mouse between these two people, which teeters dangerously close to reaching a point of violent conflict. Designed as a deliberate throwback to the glossy, trashy erotic thrillers of the 1980s and 1990s, particularly in exploring themes of desire, obsession and duplicity, Night Nurse had a lot of potential, and on paper its premise seemed perversely compelling and appropriately provocative. However, it is a work defined more by style than substance, with Bernstein’s approach foregrounding mood and aesthetic long before it engages critically with the core themes, leading to a film that does challenge us in some ways, but ultimately mistakes atmosphere for depth, leaning far too heavily on visual cues to imply complexity, rather than earning it through more conventional means.

It is no secret that Night Nurse is not a story-driven film, since from the very first scene we’re plunged into a series of moments that don’t initially make sense, but only through piecing together fragments do we eventually come to understand what they represent. This is a film that hinges almost entirely on its atmosphere, building the story around long stretches in which the characters engage in a kind of hushed tension, their lingering glances saying more than their words, and flirting with danger as they engage in what is clearly a very risky act, both socially and legally. However, despite having clear intentions, Night Nurse fails to deliver a meaningful escalation of these ideas – it is not enough to simply introduce a concept; it is also necessary to follow through on it, which is not the case with this film and the root of its eventual downfall. There are moments where the film is flirting with outright parody – the sultry pacing, exaggerated seriousness and heightened erotic menace making us wonder whether this is some darkly comedic satire or self-aware homage, until we realise that the hammer never falls. Instead of committing to the irony (which would have made this a far more interesting film), it insists on its own importance to the point of becoming repetitive, the provocation being merely ornamental, a bizarre novelty to leer at rather than interrogate. For a film built around psychosexual desire, Night Nurse is surprisingly inert and static, never nearly as scintillating as it would want us to believe, the debauchery being wildly overstated. This results in a film that suggests the idea of transgression, without actually grappling with the emotional or ethical consequences, even if we are led to believe that it is aware of these elements.

Despite its shortcomings, we can still see that Night Nurse is a film that wanted to say something – the problem is that it didn’t know how to say it without becoming too heavy-handed or needlessly complicated. There is some ambition in terms of the themes it wishes to explore – this is a film about deception and manipulation, and how they can be the result of some unspoken malice that lurks beneath the surface of seemingly placid spaces. There was potential for some fascinating observations, with the film leaving the door open for conversations around caregiving, consent and the boundaries of intimacy (particularly in professional settings, with the ambiguity between carer and patient providing a quite promising subject), but rather than actually using its controversial subject matter to say something memorable, none of this ever happens. The film is more than content to just depict two characters engaging in morally corrupt behaviour to satisfy their urges, leaving it there without spending any time actually developing the idea. It gets to the point where its perversions curdle into a kind of deep misanthropy, the characters being treated with relentless cruelty (especially considering this is a film about the elderly, who receive very little compassion here), victims and predators who barely resemble anything even vaguely realistic. The performers are not to blame, since there’s only so much that they can do with such a limited script – but even at its core, this is a film where the character development is practically non-existent, and we never understand their motivations, nor is whatever shred of curiosity we still possess by the end ever satisfied. It’s brutally exploitative and believes that discomfort is an appropriate response, rather than daring to put in more effort than the bare minimum allowed.

Night Nurse is a film in which ambiguity is a design flaw rather than a narrative feature, with the intention to explore a complex subject coming across less as a provocative piece and more as the result of artistic indecision. For a film that wants to unsettle the status quo, it is surprisingly bland and lifeless, never reaching a coherent point and instead giving off the illusion of complexity through clever cinematic tricks rather than anything concrete. The film is competently made and visually polished, and there are a couple of moments where we may find our curiosity piqued, suggesting the possibility that a better film lies buried beneath the surface, hidden under layers of heavy-handed commentary and peculiar narrative decisions. The biggest flaw with this film is not that it is a perverse work, but rather its outright failure to transform that perversity into something meaningful, saying very little of value in the process. This ultimately descends into a film that refuses to clarify its intentions, and therefore doesn’t manage to transcend its status as a visually striking but narratively hollow pastiche, echoing the more daring erotic thrillers that inspired it, rather than being a reinvention or revival. The lack of real substance and a premise that is paper-thin mean that Night Nurse never manages to sustain any of its themes, settling on being more of a decorative novelty than anything memorable, mistaking mood for meaning, and simply becoming a bundle of missed opportunities across the board.