Northwest (***1/4) [screening]

Eighteen-year-old Casper (Gustav Giese) is a small-time burglar-for-hire who sees a chance for something better, though equally illegal. But as making money suddenly gets a lot easier, ditching his old business associates proves a lot harder. What makes this movie a cut above other stories of ambitious criminals is in Casper’s relationships to the other characters, particularly his younger brother Andy, played by the Geise’s actual brother, Oscar. Casper is basically a nice guy. He’s a loving brother to his little sister. He’s nice to his mother, who tells him to keep Andy out of his schemes but doesn’t ask how come Casper’s income seems to have swelled. He’s protective of the prostitutes he drives around on jobs for his new boss.

Danish director Michael Noer tells this story plainly, without any moralizing. (The title refers to the seamier part of Copenhagen.) Perhaps burglarizing empty homes and being a driver seem too antiseptic for Caspar to feel morally troubled by his activities. But he does eventually recognize the danger to himself and the difficult choices he’ll be required to make. And that no matter how he has tried to insulate his family from his activities and those choices, he cannot prevent their impact.

IMDb link

viewed 10/20/13 2:35 PM at Cinemark University City [Philadelphia Film Festival] and posted 10/20/13

The Hunt (***1/2)

It’s been a few decades since western countries began broad public movements to root out sexual abuse. No doubt this has been to the good and has reduced the number of child victims, but some people may also remember a number of false accusations in the 1980s against child-care providers, and a side effect may be that men who work with children become slightly suspect. I didn’t know what this film was about when I saw it, but this slight suspicion was part of my reaction when I saw Lucas (Mads Mikkelsen), a divorced father working in a small-town kindergarten. And, as it turns out, the plot centers around an accusation that he has abused his neighbor’s little girl.

In fact, he appears to be the victim of a misunderstanding. The first half of the Danish drama shows the steps by which entirely reasonable people could come to believe in the man’s guilt; the second is more about Lucas’s stunned reaction. Annika Wedderkopp sweetly plays the little girl who cannot anticipate, and only slowly comprehends, the impact of ephemeral remarks. The theme of wrongful accusation has been at the center of several classic films, including Twelve Angry Men, North by Northwest, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Atonement. This isn’t a thriller like North by Northwest and doesn’t focus on the legal case like the other three; it’s a smaller kind of film, but powerful in its way. Director Thomas Vinterberg is still probably best known for his 1998 feature The Celebration; this film is its equal.

IMDb link

viewed 8/8/13 at Ritz East and reviewed 8/8/13

A Hijacking (***)

This is the Somali pirate version of a police procedural. The particulars of the story are fictional, but everything is realistic enough that it seems otherwise. The story does not offer twists and turns, or any action —even the hijacking itself takes place off camera, experienced from the point of view of the Danish CEO being notified — but the slow buildup of tension on the part of both the captives and their families back home. The ransom negotiations are the main focus, a fascinating exercise in game theory. The CEO (Søren Malling), certainly the most memorable, and intense, character, heeds the advice of the negotiator he hires and lowballs the Somali negotiator (who denies that he himself is a pirate). But as time passes, and the captives suffer further deprivations, he must decide on his own course.

IMDb link

viewed 6/20/13 7:30 at Ritz Bourse [PFS screening] and posted 11/2/13

In a Better World (***3/4)

This was the winner of the Foreign Language Film Oscar, and it’s better than the Best Picture winner, The King’s Speech. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the latter, but it settles for being a well-told drama without ever surprising the viewer in any way. Danish writer-director Susanne Bier likes to tell harder stories, of people caught between conflicting loyalties. She is best known for her features Brothers (faithfully remade as an American film in 2009) and After the Wedding. Those films and this one (all written in collaboration with Anders Thomas Jensen) have the common element of a male main character who has returned from overseas. Anton (Mikael Persbrandt) is that character here, a doctor who spends much of his time away from home, treating victims of violence in a refugee camp in Africa. He is separated from his wife, with whom he has a young son.

The parallel story concerns Christian, a taciturn boy who has just returned to Denmark from London following the death of his mother. Christian takes the side of a boy who’s been bullied and helps him take revenge upon his tormenter. Yet at the same time we applaud this as justice, the anger from which it stems is unsettling. The story of the boy and of the man both intersect and parallel each other, though it takes a bit of time to see how. The obvious point, though, is that whether it’s in civilized, modern Denmark or a country ruled by warlords, the dark heart of man lies only a bit beneath the surface. It is only because most people in places like Denmark submit to the rule of law that keeps the one sort of place from becoming the other. Returning to Africa, Christian must operate on a different set of values.

In the end, Bier veers from this theme and more toward those of family and loss, which is less difficult. In the way it is also about these things, it becomes more broadly accessible. One might quibble with the tidiness in which this plot unfolds, but for the most part her and Jensen’s script is a model of good storytelling. In a better world, there would be a larger place for thoughtful films like those of Bier.

IMDB link

viewed 4/20/11 at Ritz Five and reviewed 5/10/11

Terribly Happy (***1/4)

Small towns in movies almost always come in four flavors: quaint, quirky, creepy, and cruddy. The Danish town here looks quaint, but turns out to be creepy, much like the one in The White Ribbon. In both movies, an outsider is the central character. Here, a new marshal (Jakob Cedergren), sent from the big city (i.e., Copenhagen), encounters diffident townsfolk who seem to be hiding secrets. A woman casually mentions some disappearances, like the local bike shop owner. And she tells him that her husband has beaten her, but still she returns to the man, who seems to be feared by everyone. Repeatedly, the marshal is told that he doesn’t know how things are done in the tiny town. It’s all mysterious in the manner of beginnings to a certain type of horror film, and I half expected the town’s mysteries to be explained via murderous ghosts, or aliens in human bodies. (A somewhat similar beginning begets comic mayhem in Hot Fuzz.)

But this is a suspense drama, not a horror film, and as much about the marshal character as about the character of small towns. It’s no allegory, like The White Ribbon, but a smaller-focused (and lower-budget) film along the lines of the Coen Brothers’ debut, Blood Simple, with maybe a hint of David Lynch in his less-outré moments. Director/co-writer Henrik Ruben Genz, who adapted a novel by Erling Jepsen, is no newcomer, but this is his first film to be released in US theaters. He also plans to remake the movie in English. I’m thinking Jason Lee, who bears a mild resemblance to Cedergren, would do as the lead. In any case, one thing that should not be changed is the ending, in which justice is served in a different way than I was expecting.

IMDB link

viewed at Ritz Bourse and reviewed 4/1/10

The Pig (***1/4) [2009 Oscar-nominated shorts program]

An older man’s fixation on a painting of a pig (it comforts him during a hospital stay) turns from quasi-comic to philosophical in 20 minutes. The Danish film winds up asking what it means to be considerate, and tolerant.

IMDB link

viewed at Ritz Bourse and reviewed 2/11/09

Pistoleros (**1/4)

A whole mess of Danish gangsters double-cross and kill each other over a cache of cash hidden after a botched heist…as told to a couple of aspiring Copenhagen filmmakers. Director Sparky Gonzalez comes off as a low-rent Guy Ritchie (Snatch, Revolver), though with some spaghetti western touches, like the soundtrack. Without Ritchie’s sense of style, and a script that’s less clever than convoluted, the whole thing comes off as contrived.

IMDB link

viewed and reviewed 4/4/08; screened at Philadelphia Film Festival.

The Boss of It All (***)

I rarely think this about a foreign film, but this would be a great movie for Hollywood to remake, notwithstanding that it was made by artsy-fartsy Danish auteur Lars von Trier. The director himself appears on screen to let us know this will not be “difficult,” but merely a comedy. Presumably this sort of notice that not all will be serious is necessary for those familiar with films such as Breaking the Waves, Dancer in the Dark, Dogville, and Antichrist. But the premise alone is delicious enough to provoke a smile here. An actor with delusions of greatness (Jens Albinus) is hired to briefly portray an IT company’s absent company president, only to find his assignment extended so that he must become what he pretends to be. It turns out that the boss is actually the fictitious creation of the company’s founder, who prefers to shield himself from blame for his unpopular decisions.

Von Trier is no longer using the rigid Dogme rules for shooting his films, but instead uses Automavision, whereby a computer selects how a scene will be shot. The result seems more natural than with the handheld (i.e. slightly shaky) cameras of Dogme, but I thought that a story that would lend itself to zippy screwball comedy comes off more like an episode of The Office. That can still be pretty funny when the actor, obsessed by the pedantic theories of a pretentious playwright, is forced to improvise. And the way the company’s potential buyers, a pair of Icelanders, display their contempt for their former colonial overlords, is all the more amusing for being, to an American, an obscure avenue for comedy. Minus this and one or two other things (e.g., the unnecessary voiceovers), I see Kevin Spacey and Jeff Bridges as the leads in the American remake.

IMDB link

viewed 1/25/10 on DVD and reviewed 1/26/10

After the Wedding (***1/2)

? An orphanage manager (Mads Mikkelsen) reluctantly leaves Bombay to return to his native Denmark to make a funding pitch to a wealthy businessman. An offhand invitation to the wedding of the businessman’s daughter leads to an unexpected reunion with consequences for both men, as well as for the businessman’s wife and children. Directed by Susanne Bier (Brothers, Open Hearts).

+ The well-crafted screenplay has two significant surprises that have stunning consequences. In the businessman we see both how wealth is used for power and the limits of that power. His actions create an unexpected moral dilemma for the other man. Mikkelsen, who played the villain Le Chiffre in Casino Royale, shows his versatility, and the rest of the cast is equally strong. I especially liked Rolf Lassgård as the rich man whose actions leave the most room for different interpretations, and whom we see as imperious CEO, doting father, angry drunk, and more.

- I think I’d have liked there to be another scene in the movie where I found out more about what the other characters think about the aforementioned moral dilemma. Bier’s frequent use of extreme close-ups is occasionally distracting.

= ***1/2 Whether you like good plot twists, morality plays, or just good character dramas, this is a winner that deserved its nomination for Best Foreign Language film.

IMDb link

After the Wedding (***1/2)

? An orphanage manager (Mads Mikkelsen) reluctantly leaves Bombay to return to his native Denmark to make a funding pitch to a wealthy businessman. An offhand invitation to the wedding of the businessman’s daughter leads to an unexpected reunion with consequences both men, as well as for the businessman’s wife and children. Directed by Susanne Bier (Brothers, Open Hearts).
+ The well-crafted screenplay has two significant surprises that have stunning consequences. In the businessman we see both how wealth is used for power and the limits of that power. His actions create an unexpected moral dilemma for the other man. Mikkelsen, who played the villain Le Chiffre in Casino Royale, shows his versatility, and the rest of the cast is equally strong. I especially liked Rolf Lassgård as the rich man whose actions leave the most room for different interpretations, and whom we see as imperious CEO, doting father, angry drunk, and more.
- I think I’d have liked there to be another scene in the movie where I found out more about what the other characters think about the aforementioned moral dilemma. Bier’s frequent use of extreme close-ups is occasionally distracting.
= ***1/2 Whether you like good plot twists, morality plays, or just good character dramas, this is a winner that deserved its nomination for Best Foreign Language film.

IMDB link

reviewed 5/11/07