In Silent Friend, Hannes (Enzo Brumm) is profoundly transformed while caring for a plant. Lena Kettner/Pandora Film hide caption

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Lena Kettner/Pandora Film

Some movies will forever change the way you look at plants.

Unsurprisingly, many of them are thrillers and science-fiction films, like Little Shop of Horrors , The Day of the Triffids , or, more recently, the mind-controlling flower freakout Little Joe . You could probably make a more sinister version of the new drama Silent Friend , which dares to suggest that the tree outside your door or the geranium on your windowsill might be studying you intently — and might even reach out, if it could, and tell you what it's thinking.

But the Hungarian filmmaker Ildikó Enyedi isn't interested in scaring us.…