With the full moon glowing and the black cat’s eyes gleaming, the protagonist seems unsure of what kind of film he has wound up in. Memories of a lost loved one and their time together become entangled with hallucinations and a growing fear that she might have returned. She appears to be everywhere, yet his own life seems to be slipping further away. When the presence of a prematurely lost love starts to feel more real than anything else, the man descends into the darkest labyrinths of his psyche.

It would hardly be an overstatement to say that Vilkas has managed to create a Baltic take on Stephen King and magical realism, leveraging the genre to reflect on the profound impact of loss. In a manner reminiscent of the cult series The Twilight Zone (1959–1964), he subverts expectations about the representation of tragedy and teases with daring B-movie tropes. The debut short film by the Lithuanian theatre director – now also a filmmaker – is a celebration of rich cinematic history, regional sensibilities and the gift of relationships. As he himself notes, he listens to his eight-year-old daughter’s advice.