The Gardener (2017) unfolds like a quiet fever dream, circling around a man who spends his days digging in his backyard as though unearthing a secret buried deep beneath the soil. His routine feels obsessive, almost ritualistic, driven by an invisible weight that presses on him from the edges of his perception.

As he digs, the film drops in and out of fragmented memories, pulling the viewer into his sessions with a psychotherapist who becomes the only person he can speak to with any honesty. These flashbacks act like small lanterns in the dark, revealing pieces of his emotional turmoil while hinting at the shadows he cannot name.

The sense of paranoia in the story grows gradually. The gardener believes someone is watching him from afar, a presence he can never fully see but always feels. This lingering tension gives the film a subtle psychological charge, letting the audience experience the same uncertainty that grips the protagonist.

The dynamic between the man and his psychotherapist becomes the film’s emotional anchor. Their conversations explore fear, trauma, and the human instinct to search for meaning even when the mind offers nothing but confusion. She becomes both a guide and a mirror, challenging him to confront a pain he has buried deeper than the hole in his backyard.