Odotusaika (Expectancy)

2020 · 14m · Finland

Directed by Juho Fossi

Genres: drama, horror

Tones: contemplative, dark, melancholic, surreal

Alex is left alone for a weekend to renovate a nursery for his soon-to-be-born child, but a newly purchased baby monitor begins broadcasting disturbing sounds that seem to prophesy his failures as a father. The film uses slow-burn horror to excavate a man's deepest fears about parenthood, generational trauma, and whether a parent is responsible for a child's future wrongdoing.

Picked by Margot

The scouts

Baby monitor prophesies your future parental failures while you paint the nursery alone for a weekend — classic Finnish 'man stares at wall, wall stares back' horror. Centering the father's moral terror is at least a different angle than the usual Rosemary clone.

Felix

Centering paternal anxiety in a baby-monitor horror reverses the genre's customary maternal POV — Fossi is staking out the terrain Sean Durkin hovers near. A 14-minute slow-burn that interrogates inherited culpability rather than performing it.

Margot

Baby monitor as the delivery system for prophetic horror about paternal failure is a precise object-choice, and committing to the father's POV instead of the usual maternal-horror frame is the genuinely fresh angle here. 14:37 of slow-burn dread — the runtime matches the gestation metaphor.

Zoe

Reviews

A strong lead performance combined with a subtle supernatural hook, Odotusaika successfully taps into some of the most relatable fears of parenthood even when it skews into the most extreme. Surprising and shocking, this certainly isn't a film you'll soon forget.

Short of the Week

Impressively gory and atmospheric with a really excellent final shot.

Letterboxd

Festivals

  • Night Visions 2020
  • MotelX 2020
  • IIK! International Horror Film Festival 2020, Jury Award, Audience Award
  • Brest European Short Film Festival 2020
  • Tampere Film Festival 2021
  • Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival 2021
  • Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival 2021
  • Fantastic Fest 2021
  • Telluride Horror Show 2021
  • Beyond Fest 2022
  • Nightmares Film Festival 2022

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