Poppy's Saturn
2023 · 15m · Belgium
Directed by Nicole Tegelaar
Genres: drama, experimental, musical, sci-fi
Tones: melancholic, surreal
When nightclub singer Poppy is confronted by a black-eyed man, the encounter triggers a buried trauma she must overcome in a kaleidoscopic world of glitter, music, and blood — a surreal, experimental sci-fi musical about processing sexual violence.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Glitter sci-fi musical about sexual assault trauma in a kaleidoscopic 80s/Tumblr palette — that's a tonal high-wire act, and a sincere try to handle the subject without exploiting it. Could be transcendent or could be aestheticized horror.
Tegelaar's glam-rock-kaleidoscope approach to processing sexual violence subverts the typical graphic-depiction trap, in the lineage of Mary Harron and the visual register of Lana Wachowski. Modest view counts but ambitious form.
14:44 surreal sci-fi musical processing sexual violence through a glam-rock kaleidoscope of glitter and blood — the aesthetic choice to subvert graphic depiction with 80s-glitter-meets-Tumblr-pink is the right ethical and formal move. 801 views and 2 likes is very low audience-side signal though.
Reviews
A Lynchian fever dream that leans into feeling over clarity, trading conventional narrative for a haunting, glitter-soaked journey through trauma.
As visually striking as it is mystifying, the film explores how we unpack troubling events from our past through its disorienting, kaleidoscopic visuals.
Festivals
- Fantasia International Film Festival 2023, Best Score (Matthias Dewilde)
- Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival (BIFFF) 2024
- Abertoir Horror Festival 2024
- Nederlands Film Festival