Koko-di Koko-da, from writer/director Johannes Nyholm, is what I imagine you would get if you forced Lars Von Trier at gunpoint to remake Happy Death Day. Elin ( Ylva Gallon ) and Tobias ( Leif Edlund ) are on vacation with their daughter, Maja ( Katarina Jakobson ), who suddenly dies for unknown reasons. Cut to 3 years later and the couple, who are still struggling with their loss, decide they’re ready to finally take another vacation. Far from the happy family road trip we see at the beginning of the film, this consists of pitching a makeshift tent out in the middle of the forest. This is when the film simultaneously gets going and screeches to a halt as the couple is beset upon by a group of seemingly aimless psychopaths lead by their jolly ringleader Mog, played by 60s Danish rockstar, Peter Belli . The couple are cornered and murdered brutally, though much is left to the viewer’s imagination. We then cut to Elin peering out from beneath the tent and the cycle continues for the remainder of the film with minor variations.

What separates this film from Happy Death Day, aside from its substantially different mood, is that there is little progress or insight obtained from each cycle. Tobias remembers what has happened, though Elin does not, and while this does work as a commentary on the futility of running from death and the hopelessness of losing a child, the result is a film that’s about as far afield from any sense of entertainment as you could get. Koko-di Koko-da is a melancholic meditation on grief and loss and while it possesses a unique spirit, its utter lack of substance and narrative development makes for an often frustrating experience that seems like it could have done much more with just an occasional nugget of context.

The performances are compelling for those characters who are given character, Tobias and Mog in particular. Tobias is our deeply-flawed hero, who in excruciatingly slow fashion pulls himself out from beneath his terror and impotence but while we sympathize with his humanity, his cowardice in the face of certain death is at times difficult to swallow. Mog is your typical jovial psychopath who we yearn to understand on some level but our yearnings are left perpetually unsatisfied. Still, his dark humor adds a certain vibrancy that is desperately needed as we wallow in the vast, oppressive expanses of the Swedish winter. Mog’s accomplices Sampo ( Morad Baloo Khatchadorian ) and Cherry ( Brandy Litmanen ) don’t get any lines or much in the way of character development outside of Sampo being a hulking brute and Cherry enjoying shooting guys in the dick with her Luger. Elin doesn’t have much to do either, with most of her screen time up until the last 20 minutes consisting of her telling Tobias she needs to pee and subsequently peeing before she is inevitably murdered.

Koko-di Koko-da sits on the edge of the pool of its potential brilliant madness, suggesting an incomparable style and vision that it’s unwilling to share lest we look behind the curtain and see that there’s nothing there. Fans of Von Trier’s more austere work might find enough to occupy themselves with peeling back the layers of visual metaphor the film occasionally allows us but even for those that enjoy films that don’t supply us with all the answers, Koko-di Koko-da’s lack of substantial questions may leave them wanting.