Amy (Kate Lynn Sheil) has a small problem – she is going to die tomorrow, or at least she thinks she is. A recovering alcoholic, her friends attribute these thoughts to a relapse, which she vehemently denies, being steadfast in her belief that she’s going to meet her demise the following day. Her best friend Jane (Jane Adams) tries to convince her that she is being irrational and needs to be more logical, since there’s no way to be sure that she’s on the precipice of death, unless she is planning to harm herself. However, despite her protestations, Jane starts to feel the same, growing to believe that she is on her way out as well – and she finds that she is unable to find help, since everyone she speaks to about her impending doom claiming she is psychologically unstable, and is more of a danger to herself than she is to anyone else. However, what each of these people soon learn is that as soon as the idea enters into their mind, they start to believe it themselves. Before long, there is a growing set of people who are gradually losing their minds, seeing strange visions that inform them of their incoming death, and everyone deals with it differently – some of them are pushed to the edge of their sanity through panic attacks and nervous breakdowns, while others are more calm and collected, coming to terms with the news and processing it in a way that is constructive and productive. However, the next day is looming, and despite being convinced, none of them truly know what to expect.

Amy Seimetz is an essential voice in contemporary independent cinema. She has a small body of work as a director, but with each of her films being distinct additions to a rising group of young arthouse stars that are redefining the industry, especially when it comes to genre work. She Dies Tomorrow is a film built out of bewilderment – from the first moments, we aren’t ever sure of what is to come, whether in terms of the story or the approach the director will take in bringing it to life. Singularly impossible to categorize, this is a film that straddles the boundaries between psychological horror, character-driven drama and darkly comical thriller, all of which are found throughout the film, explored and exploited with a subversive brilliance that is absent in even the most high-concept blockbusters, which normally prioritize spectacle over the more intimate ideas She Dies Tomorrow is based around. These genre-bending films are becoming increasingly popular, especially within communities of filmmakers that attempt to defy the rules – and in terms of contemporary breakout stars, no one seems better poised to define this line of thought than Seimetz, whose incredible talent for captivating viewers with her masterful control of both form and content situates her at the top of the lists of filmmakers we should be taking extremely seriously, and if She Dies Tomorrow is any indication, there is certainly no reason to doubt how she is already an impeccable artist with an incredible set of skills.

Seimetz is a director who seems to profoundly respect her audience – but that doesn’t mean that she believes we’re entitled to any real answers, which seems to be the mantra to She Dies Tomorrow. I’m often reminded of David Lynch’s polite but curt response of “no” when he was asked to explain the meaning behind Eraserhead, since art has always been about infusing meaning into a work, but with our human instincts naturally being to decode them, to the point where it can sometimes detract from the experience when we become too involved in solving the mystery than we are exploring the art as it stands. Seimetz has claimed that the impetus of She Dies Tomorrow was on reactions to anxiety – and if there’s ever a film that is more timely, it’s this one. Not only is it built on the idea of looking at mental health as a serious issue, but the spread of a “disease” amongst communities that come into contact with it and are subsequently infected could not have come at a more inopportune time, considering the world we’re currently living in. However, as prophetic as She Dies Tomorrow is, the more we try and rationalize it, the less we actually understand it, and it can impinge on the overall experience of such a work, since the message isn’t embedded in anything traditional, but rather concealed in the more abstract moments.

Logic doesn’t have much of a place in this film, which instead focuses on more visceral descriptions of the psychological states of the characters – this is where the film is most interesting when we are given the chance to bear witness to these characters and their reactions to the idea that they are dying the following day. It’s fertile ground for a compelling character study, and the director does very well in evoking a particular atmosphere that contributes to the overall experience. A bleak and haunting psychological drama, with traces of dark comedy and unhinged horror appearing at different moments, the film can be somewhat impenetrable – Seimetz is not too concerned with making this a particularly enjoyable experience, even if She Dies Tomorrow is wildly entertaining at some moments. Comedy is injected into some moments in the film, particularly those early on, to establish a particular tone. A young woman lamenting about her hopes to be turned into a leather jacket after her death, or another showing up to a birthday party in her pyjamas, much to the chagrin of her guests – these are all amusing concepts that appear quite funny at first, but as the film progresses, and we see how every choice in this film was entirely deliberate, we are shocked to discover that beneath every moment of humour, there’s a much darker meaning that manifests later in the film. A multifaceted work that simply can’t be pinned down, She Dies Tomorrow is quite an achievement, albeit a deeply unsettling one that consistently keeps us in suspense, purposefully without any relief.

She Dies Tomorrow is more thought-provoking than it is easygoing, and as a result can be somewhat challenging – but what better way to have conversations about mental health, deteriorating relationships, addiction and death than through an abstract series of vignettes that only loosely connect based on a shared theme of the great inevitability of life? There are certainly some very interesting ideas pulsating throughout this film, and it can take some work to fully comprehend – or rather, to come to terms with the fact that we’re not going to get a neat and satisfying resolution, and rather that our failure to understand isn’t a fault of our own, or a shortcoming of the film as a whole, but rather an intentional choice made on the part of the director. A work of what could be considered late-period postmodernism (or metamodernism, if we were to attempt to really define this by a particular movement), She Dies Tomorrow is a profoundly fascinating film that has some wonderfully strange ideas that manifest in remarkably interesting ways, even if it can sometimes be a puzzling experience to work through this film since so many of the concepts embedded in it are so abstract and distant from what mainstream cinema conveys. However, it is a deeply rewarding experience, one that takes some adjusting, but ultimately becomes quite an insightful work of independent filmmaking that doesn’t seem to align itself with any discernible school of thought, and rather is defined by its incredible ability to be true to its deranged vision.