“Nocebo” is the latest movie written by Garret Shanley and helmed by Lorcan Finnegan, and it stars the likes of Eva Green as Christine, Mark Strong as Felix, Chai Fonacier as Diana, and Billie Gadson as Bobs. The movie is a slow yet exciting psychological thriller and follows the story of Christine ( played by Eva Green), a brilliant and successful fashion designer. Sadly, things begin to go downhill quickly when Christine is infected with a strange and nameless illness, forcing her to leave her job and stay at home. However, her conditions improved when she hired a Filipino nanny who began treating her with nontraditional means.
Spoilers Ahead
‘Nocebo’ Plot Synopsis: What Happens In The Film?
Christine resumes her daily life after driving her little girl to school and overseeing a children’s fashion show for her company, Vesmodo. However, her work is interrupted when she receives a strange phone call that completely sends her into shock. She disconnects the call and sees a grubby and soiled dog that shrugs itself in front of her, infecting her with a mysterious illness. Christine’s life is no longer the same after the infection, as she has trouble remembering things and even suffers tremors that prevent her from driving her daughter back from school. Christine even forgets she had hired a Filipino Nanny named Diana to help her with daily chores and to take care of her daughter Bob. Christine helps Diana settle in and offers her the room next to her studio. Christine is a fashion designer, the best in business, and she masterfully oscillates her life between her job and her family. Diana, on the other hand, looks off-putting and maybe malicious, as shown by the prolonged stare she gives Christine every time they cross paths. Felix is shocked and rather unhappy about Christine hiring a Filipino nanny without any prior discussion, and even Bob, Christine’s daughter, shares her dissatisfaction with the decision. Diana convinces Christine to let her cook dinner for the family and discreetly smuggles strange herbs and powders into the Humba, a famous Filipino delicacy, attracting the appreciation of Felix, who calls her cooking “surprisingly good.” Suddenly, Christine suffers a stroke, and Daina helps ease her pain, finally earning her place in the house. There’s something off about Diana; she often investigates Christine’s room when she’s not around and seems to have a connection with her, and even lays sand on a newspaper outside her door before calling it a day. The footprints she finds while folding the newspaper suggest that someone has entered her bedroom in one scene, but who? In one scene, we even see her sharing the same dream with Christine.
The Unconventional Treatment
Bob is having a hard time bonding with her new Nanny, and her disaffection for Dianna deepens when Christine allows Diana to ride shotgun so Diana can see the route to Bob’s school. However, Christine’s condition worsens, and the Nanny suggests they cover the rest of the distance on foot. Christine’s health has deteriorated to the extent that she couldn’t even drive her daughter to school. Furthermore, she is forced to stay at home and enlist the aid of her helpers to complete her design projects. The pain and tremors have become unbearable, and Christine is left with no choice but to ask Diana to treat her with her traditional remedies. Diana’s methods are unconventional and unlike anything her employer has ever seen. She blows into a jar topped off with dirty water and blows into it with a straw to extract the unwelcome elements from Christine’s body, weakening her. But how did she learn all that? In reality, Diana harbors the soul of an “Umu” inside her, and that’s why she’s able to heal Christine. Decades ago, when Diana was little, an old woman knocked on her door begging for help. The woman was a “UMU” and was blessed with powers of healing and destruction. Soon afterward, the old woman dies, and her soul, in the form of a nestling, enters Diana’s body, possessing her. Diana felt different after becoming a UMU and often saw the spirit of her predecessor. Diana came from a poor household and was forced to use her gift in return to make ends meet. Diana recommends that Christine get some rest, revealing that the effects are just transitory and that in order to get healed, she needs to continue the treatment. Diana has completely earned Christine’s trust and requests that she treat all her symptoms, ranging from her psychotic episodes to dizziness. She also cites her encounter with the “grumpy” dog laced with clusters of hideous ticks. Bob reveals to her father that she saw Diana flying off the roof, up into the clouds, but Felix turns her down, labeling it a dream. Meanwhile, Diana continues to treat Christine, sometimes burning her hair off to ward off evil elements, but the treatments are messing up her mind. She has even had nightmares of suffocating in a smoke-filled room.
Diana Is Kicked Out
Felix visits Diana and asks her to halt her treatment, and she subtly threatens him to stay out of his way. Felix exits the room and is attacked by his pet bird on the stairs, and he unintentionally kills him. As the bird crashes to the ground, we can see a tick crawling away from its corpse, which raises the possibility that it was possessed. After “Big Bird’s death,” Bob is grieving and emotionally numb, making herself vulnerable to accept Diana’s friendship proposition. Christine’s condition has improved, and she’s now able to return to work and even drive her daughter back home. On the other hand, Felix breaks into Diana’s bedroom and discovers blood vials, a snapshot of Diana and her daughter, and Christine’s medicine. Felix questions Diana, accusing her of manipulating and controlling his wife. Diana denies providing any explanation and is asked to pack her stuff and leave, but slithers a tick into Diana’s room. As expected, Christine’s condition worsens, and she is constantly haunted by ticks and a filthy dog and even experiences nightmares of her husband’s death. Diana had completely infiltrated Bob’s mind and made her lie and say that it was Felix who had hidden the medicine under Diana’s bed. Christine takes her anger out on Felix, blaming her for her condition, but the latter is again attacked and is incapacitated after plummeting from the stairs. Realizing Felix is no longer there to stop her, Diana returns to Christine to conclude the treatment. But there’s more to this than meets the eye.
‘Nocebo’ Ending Explained – Why Did Diana Kill Christine?
In reality, Diana holds Christine responsible for her daughter’s death and wants Christine to suffer the same fate. Years ago, Christine had to travel to the Philippines to oversee the fabrication of her designed dresses, and she asked the factory manager to lock the door to prevent theft and even advised the manager to force workers to put in extra hours. Diana was one of the employees working in the factory and was forced to take her daughter to work with her. One day, fire breaks out on the premises, and dozens of workers, including Diana’s daughter, are trapped inside and burned to death. Also, the phone call Christine receives at the outset of the movie is to inform her of the incident, and the footprints we see outside Diana’s room belong to her daughters. Diana intends to take Bob away from Christine to remind her what it’s like to live with the pain of losing a loved one. Diana starts a fire, and Christine dies the same death as her daughter and afterward asks Bob to go to the garden. Diana jumps from the terrace and kills herself, and the audience sees the nestling leaving her body and possessing Bob, just like it happened to her decades ago. Diana eventually earns her revenge and commits suicide so she can be with her daughter, and Bob has become the new “Umu” and now holds the same healing powers as her Nanny.
“Nocebo” is a 2022 mystery thriller film directed by Lorcan Finnegan.
