SPIRIT OF INDEPENDENCE 2020: DAY X

DAY X (TAG X) (2019)

Starring: Carina Diesing, Tobias Kay, Reinhard Paul Seyer

Writers: Manuel Weiss, Jessica Renelt

Director: Manuel Weiss

Widow Tanja (Diesing) suddenly begins to receive strange phone calls and then notices a shadowy figure across the road from her house. Matters escalate when Tanja's daughter Lilly goes missing and a disturbing secret from the past comes to light, which may be connected with the disappearance of another young girl five years previously...

A slow burner that takes at least some of the essence of Scandi-noir and takes it on a trip to Germany, Manuel Weiss' doomy thriller opens just at the point of something dreadful happening and then rewinds a few days to allow for an unhurried set-up in which we see how Tanja is attempting to cope with the loss of her husband. Things are obviously not helped in the slightest by her potential stalker and she's pushed towards the edge of sanity once Lilly is abducted.

On hand to investigate is Kommissar Schwarz (Kay), a caring detective who wants to solve the crime because, of course, he's a cop, but he also thinks that Tanja has had more than enough trauma in her life up to this point. However, with no obvious clues and the shadow of the previous unsolved case hanging over the department, he's under his own stresses too.

Wisely, the most disturbing plot developments are kept off screen as the story heads to some particularly dark places in its second act, introducing characters who may be key to the investigation or will function as just another layer of obfuscation - or both. The script plays upon the obvious parallels between the crimes of the present and the past but takes the proceedings in a less than obvious direction.

The expected cat and mouse between the various protagonists does take place but not in the usual "evil genius versus dogged cop" way. Tag X places a great deal of emphasis upoon the everyday, whether it's the crimes themselves or the effects on those touched by them. It's less of a procedural than a study of the psychological breakdown of the investigators, the victims and the perpetrators so if you're looking for scene after scene in conference rooms with cops sticking Post-Its to board, those are in very short supply.

The pace may be a touch languid but the hopelessness which suffuses the situation is well crafted and even the smallest breaks in the case provide no easy answers, leading to a final act which will no doubt divide due to its chillingly prosaic conclusion. There's no breathless pursuit of suspects, no race against time and little in the way of relief for its audience, ending abruptly and leaving the viewer to deal with its ramifications long after the end credits have rolled.

With so many thrillers of this ilk fighting for space in the genre as movies and longer-form TV series it's easy for the lower-budgeted and less marketed titles such as Tag X to get lost in the shuffle and although it's by no means a game changer it doesn't deserve to be confined to be bin of obscurity either. It's committed to the dark path it follows and for those of us who don't mind spending an hour and a half or so in such a murky world it's undoubtedly watchable and occasionally gripping in its own sobering way.