Megalomaniac (2 Stars)

This is the fifth film in the Stuttgart Fantasy Film Festival.

"Megalomaniac" was introduced as a film that's won awards at recent film festivals, so I sat watching it with high expectations. In its favour, the film has an intense atmosphere and brutally realistic violence. What speaks against it is that it doesn't make sense.

There's an underlying plot which is easy to follow. In the 1990's there was a serial killer in Belgium who left dead women in bags at the roadside. He was never caught, and he stopped killing when he had children. 27 years later his son Felix decides to follow in his father's footsteps, imitating his father's crimes. His daughter Martha is shocked by her brother's murder spree, but she accepts it.

If the film had kept to this simple plot, it would have been a masterpiece. Unfortunately, it adds other things. Martha is mentally ill and sees a duplicate of herself. For most of the film I wasn't sure whether this was a delusion or really happening. There's also a monster, possibly the children's father, trapped in the attic. Felix brings home a woman for Martha to play with, and Martha tortures her. In some scenes we see demons, which may or may not be part of Martha's delusions. 

Any film that includes delusions needs to be explained to the viewer. I was confused. There are other films that are difficult to understand, such as "Lost Highway", but they're films that have a meaning waiting to be discovered. In the case of "Megalomaniac" there are no hidden meanings, it's just confusion for the sake of it.