ABOVE THE KNEE (2025)
Writer/director Viljar Bøe has a twisted mind. Behind 2022’s criminally overlooked GOOD BOY, Bøe returns with the savagely uncomfortable ABOVE THE KNEE. He penned the script with the film’s star Freddy Singh, bringing a strong emotional core to a film that might feel alien to many viewers. The co-writers explore what is known as body integrity dysphoria (or body integrity identity disorder), an incredibly rare mental health condition where someone believes a limb or other healthy part of their body should be removed. The mental image they possess of their body doesn’t match their actual body, which sometimes results in them resorting to something extreme to make the two pictures align.
Amir (Singh) believes his left leg is rotten. He’s often agitated over the physical presence of his leg. He hasn’t told a living soul, not even his girlfriend Kim (Julie Abrahamsen). While watching TV one night, they see a news program about BID, and a local woman named Rikke (Louise Waage Anda) shares her story of believing she should be blind. The segment instantly captures Amir’s interest, as he has never met or even heard about anyone else with the condition before. He seeks her out and implores her for advice. When they strike up a platonic affair, Amir reveals his plans to stage an “accident” as a way for his leg to need amputation.
ABOVE THE KNEE is best described as a psychological horror/drama. It’s certainly not your typical horror flick; it resides within the same realm as 2019’s SWALLOW, which needles together various genre swatches (horror, thriller, drama) into its own unique fabric. You could make an argument that ABOVE THE KNEE is almost genre-less, with the writer and director smudging the lines until they’re completely unrecognizable. Singh offers a nuanced performance that’s equally powerful and unsettling. The one downside of the story is that we don’t see how body integrity dysphoria all started for Amir. That would have given the film a more fleshed-out feel, but as it stands, ABOVE THE KNEE delivers a fascinating glimpse into a little-known condition that adds a deeper layer to the complexity of human nature.
Body Integrity Dysphoria is Very Real
Body integrity dysphoria typically emerges in childhood. A 2024 case report (accessed through the National Library of Medicine) details the extensive history of a 52-year-old man in London with the condition. “He has wished to be an amputee since his childhood. He denied any intent or plan to end his life. He did not wish for an accidental death while trying to be an amputee,” reads the report, titled “The Emotional and Ethical Dilemmas of Body Integrity Dysphoria.” Instead of attempting to “change” the person, doctors often treat the patient’s intrusive thoughts to mitigate the risks of self-inflicted amputation.
A doctor’s involvement is also lacking in ABOVE THE KNEE. But then again, people frequently opt out of medical advice or treatment, as with most physical and mental conditions. It makes the story all the more tragic, as Amir spirals out of control. After he asks his old friend Jonas (Viggo Solomon) for a job at his corporate firm, Amir struggles to keep up with his workload and a rapidly approaching presentation. His deadlines, commitments, and relationships quickly suffer, with Kim picking up hints that Amir is having an affair.
His friendship with Rikke soon blossoms into something more, at least from Rikke’s perspective. That fissure in Amir’s life further drives him to the edge and leaves him teetering on the precipice of total mental decay. The film also digs into Rikke’s BID a bit. She begins to question whether making herself blind is right for her or if pretending to live as a blind person is enough. This moral and ethical conflict serves as the mangled backbone of the film. It’s rather easy to dismiss the film without knowing the reality of the condition. When scrolling the film’s Letterboxd page, a review claimed that an easy reading of the narrative could be transphobic. But like many mental health conditions, identity integrity dysphoria remains misunderstood, with very little vital information being widely shared online.
ABOVE THE KNEE Confronts Real-Life Horror
Where GOOD BOY confronts pup play versus sadism, which I wrote about for Macabre Daily, ABOVE THE KNEE dives headfirst into a mental health condition that results in a person feeling disgust and shame and withdrawing from the world, and how society perceives things they don’t understand. Viljar Bøe writes an empathetic peek into one man’s life and the struggle to comprehend his relationship to his body. The real-life horror, which may feel distant and cold to a general audience, turns into a story of acceptance and agency.
In Freddy Singh’s very capable hands, Amir becomes a human being we could all know. He could be your next-door neighbor, the clerk down at the corner store, or even a family member. From script to screen, it takes a certain level of compassion to aptly and honestly tell the story. While plenty still needs to be learned and understood about body integrity dysphoria, ABOVE THE KNEE does an admirable job in offering a perspective we’ve never seen before in film (to my knowledge). It’s essential viewing on that alone.
