The New Tenants is a 2009 short film (20 minutes) from Denmark, directed by Joachim Beck, written by Anders Thomas Jensen.
Despite the fact that the film was made in Denmark, all the dialogue is in English. Pete and Frank are a gay couple who have just moved into their new apartment the day before. They are sitting at the dinner table having a rather strained conversation when the old lady who lives downstairs knocks on the door. She asks for flour so she can make her granddaughter some cinnamon buns, and then as a casual aside reveals some surprising news: Pete and Frank's apartment was the scene of a recent triple homicide. It seems that someone murdered the previous occupant, a man named Jerry, and then killed two other neighbors when they arrived to check out the commotion.
Pete and Frank don't even have time to digest this shocking news when a succession of strangers visit the apartment. First, there's Jan (Vincent D'Onofrio), who seems to believe Jerry had sex with his wife Irene (Liane Balaban), and veers between weepy self-pity and terrifying rage. Next comes Zelko (Kevin Corrigan), a scary drug dealer who obviously is the killer, and seems to believe that Jerry stole a kilo of heroin belonging to him. Last but definitely not least, Irene—Jan's wife, and as it turns out also the old lady's granddaughter—shows up at a very opportune moment.
Tropes:
- Big Damn Heroes: Namely, Irene, who comes in unseen, picks up the tire iron from her dead husband's hand, and cracks Zelko's skull with it. Of course, the fact that she was high off her grandma's heroin cinnamon buns helped hold down the fear.
- Black Comedy: The blackest, as Pete and Frank can do little but sit in goggle-eyed astonishment as a series of bodies pile up in their apartment.
- Chekhov's Gun: The flour that Pete finds in a bag in the kitchen and lets the old lady borrow. It isn't flour.
- Cigarette of Anxiety: Frank lights up another cigarette in obvious distress after Zelko murders Jan. After Irene murders Zelko, he lights up another and gives it to Pete, who smokes it.
- Credits Gag: The credits start with a recipe for cinnamon buns.
- Happy Ending: The movie ends with Pete and Frank embracing and dancing, waltzing over the pile of bodies and out the apartment building and into the street.
- Hitler Ate Sugar: Frank grows increasingly hyperbolic when complaining about Pete hassling him about smoking, eventually moving to vegetarianism and saying "You know, that's how that vegetarian Hitler got started."
- Intoxication Ensues: Irene wanders into the apartment at the end, high as a kite, presumably from eating her grandma's heroin cinnamon rolls.
- Laughing Mad: Jan's terrifying cackling laugh is even more terrifying when it's immediately followed by weeping.
- Motor Mouth: Frank, who opens the film by going on an uninterrupted two-minute rant about how thousands of people are Dying Alone in the most undignified ways every minute. It turns out that the whole monologue was prompted by Pete's request for Frank to put out his cigarette. Eventually Pete tells him to go ahead and smoke, saying "Throat cancer might finally shut you up."
- No Name Given: The old lady who wants flour is not named. She's listed in the credits as "Grandma".
- Off-into-the-Distance Ending: Both main characters go away together to the upbeat song.
- Posthumous Character: The recently departed Jerry, who is now dead but obviously had an eventful life, screwing another man's wife and stealing a kilo of heroin.
- Real Time: No discernible time skips; the short appears to take place in real time.
- Rule of Three: In the space of about 15 minutes three people are killed in the front hallway of Pete and Frank's new apartment.
