Turn Into Me

In Natalie Djurberg’s & Hans Berg’s stop-motion film Turn into Me, which features clay figures, a naked woman staggers through the forest before collapsing to the ground to die. Soon an eerily beautiful process of decomposition begins in which the body undergoes various changes and becomes a feast for other organisms. Layer by layer, worms and larvae expose the innards. Scavengers work their way through the thicker lumps of flesh until all that remains is a skeleton, which rises at the end to perform a modern danse macabre. Hans Berg’s cheerful score stands in stark contrast to the film’s extreme imagery. With Turn into Me, Djurberg & Berg are able to transform the taboo of death into a story that imparts a sense of solace with its examination of the eternal cycle of coming into being and passing away.