In Jessica Hausner’s period drama Amour Fou, a young woman experiences a fleeting terror of flowers, though it turns out to be only one symptom of her consuming melancholia. But in Little Joe, this Austrian director’s fifth film and her first in English, there is every reason to fear them. A team of scientists, among them Alice (Emily Beecham), a single mother with a teenage son, and Chris (Ben Whishaw), who hopes to become something more than just her colleague, have created the world’s first mood-lifting, anti-depressant plant. In return for being touched and talked to, it emits a scent promoting happiness. But from the opening shots, which depict rows of these synthetic bulbs, accompanied by the sound of chimes and woodwind and a low electronic buzz, it’s clear there is something nasty in the topsoil.
The plant in its dormant state bears a resemblance to the bloodthirsty greenery from Little Shop of Horrors. Eventually, its leaves open and it sprouts a thistly crimson fur like the hair on the top of a plastic troll. The slightest attention is liable to trigger this change. When Alice breaks protocol by taking a plant home to her son, Joe (Kit Connor), the boy snaps a selfie with this new friend, which his mother has nicknamed “Little Joe”. In the presence of his camera, the plant dutifully blossoms and preens in a way that suggests traces of Kardashian DNA.
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