Reviews

Director Susanne Bier seems to ride on the horse of current danish film, which have received a lot of attention during the 1ast 15 years or so, mainly due to the revolutionary work of von Trier, Vinterberg and others. Therefor, it is of great importance not to be mislead by the mere fact that Bier's movie is danish and of anno 2004. What is there to say about such a performance? Two brothers, Michael (Ulrich Thomsen) and Jannik (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) lead two very different ways of life. When Jannik gets released from prison in which he spent couple of years because of a robbery he committed, Michael is sent to Afghanistan as a major of the Danish Army. Those among us, who are familiar with the American "Vietnam" movies may feel in this early stage of the film, what is about to happen. An amazing fiasco of kitch, scenes and ideas stolen from a countless number of other movies of the same kind, most notably "Returning Home" and "Deer Hunter" and the worst - a sick, racist attitude toward Afghanis, fighting against the occupation of their country, and contempt towards Muslioms in general, as well as their presentation as stupid inhuman monsters. The film was designed in such a fashion, that it seems that Bier was striving an invitation from Hollywood. And indeed, as Bier herself told reporters, she didn't have to wait too long. What a shame, that good actors like Ulrich Thomsen and Nikolaj Lie Kaas cooperated with such a disgrace.

Walter and Charlotte live with their 7 years old daughter Lisa in a Danish town. There is nothing unique about them. They are two small time Yupies in their 30's, leading lives which resemble the lives of many people of their social class, and probably the lives of many of the spectators. Both of them are hard working people, they have a few good, loyal friends, they own a small apartment and they are not happy. At the same time Lisa, their daughter, imagines to have an older brother, living behind the wall paper. The question raised at this point by director Ake Sandgren is, what would happen if this imaginary figure, made up by the innocent fantasy of a child, would become a real human being. When this happens one day, the imaginary brother begins a long and painful learning process. He will find out, that the gap between the expectations of a child (the one that made him up, in this case) and the realities of the adults is huge. He'll find out that the values preached by adults are there to mislead him and cover up their own true intentions. And he will have to find out, that people don't refer to what he really is, but rather use him for their purposes and perceive him as what they want him to be. With an excellent script that reminds of Lars von Trier (whose production company, Zentropa, produced the movie) and a great piece of acting by Nicolaj Lie Kaas (the imaginary figure), Peter Mygind (Walter) and Susan Olsen (Charlotte), Ake Sandgren challenges the spectator with the question, weather or not it is possible to live in modern society and remain a human being. A masterpiece of film art, which pulls the best out of the Dogme 95 principles.

In Epidemic, one of his previous films, Lars von Trier noted that "a film must be like a stone in the shoe". Eleven years after Epidemic, Lars von Trier is famous, his budgets grew larger and so do the stones he puts in the spectators shoes. No, reality is never what you think it is. It stops moving when you expect it to rush, and than it rushes in a way that makes you dizzy. People that you considered to be serious collapse when it comes to testing their intentions in reality, and people that you never took a note of will prove to be the real heroes of life. At the same time Lars von Trier and his excellent actor ensemble try to explain why (non violent) social experiments always fail, in spite of what we learn at school and watch on TV. They fail for three main reasons. First, the intentions of the hardcore of every movement of this kind are different that the ones they declare on. Second, the few who take a social project seriously will remain outside the hardcore group in a lonely, non-influential position. And third: the external conditions for running an experiment of this kind are such, that it's impact is limited up front to zero, often without the acting persons realize it. A brilliant movie of a brilliant filmmaker, who revolutionized the cinema in the last generation. A must for every thinking person.