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Reviews
I Am Dina (2002)
What a turkey
I am Dina is completely incomprehensible. It lacks focus and direction and even though action good for at least ten feature films is pressed together at a little over two hours the story drags.
The over acting makes Daniel Day-Lewis pale in comparison. (Maria Bonnevie is not only beautiful, she can make her eyes go huge, too. And she can breathe heavily. These talents are never clearer than in her scenes against Björn Floberg, who behaves as though he acts in a completely different film. Maybe he new better than to listen to the director.) Confusion surrounding the accents is complete. If those speaking with a Norwegian accent are supposed to be speaking actual Norwegian, it's only logical that the man with the Russian accent is speaking Russian. And then it's strange that all Norwegians (and the British and the Danes and Swedes and French - who knew northern Norway was such a cosmopolitan place back in the 19th century) understand him.
What director Ole Bornedal wants to convey is a little unclear. Maybe that little girls who cook their mothers alive tend to act out as young adults?
An American Carol (2008)
Very, very odd...
Is this supposed to make fun of liberals or republicans? When a few of us sat down to watch it we honestly couldn't agree. We then resorted to what Google had to say on the subject, and apparently the director and the lead actors are all republicans wanting to make a statement. But we still couldn't agree - some of us claimed they had to have been fooled by the writers.
The two biggest laughs from us was when Little Timmy hadn't had his leg fixed because Bad Uncle Michael wouldn't pay for it (yeah, socialized medicine is only for commies, we yanks think every child should have the liberty to stay crippled if they fail to choose the right parents) and when Frasier asked whether the "thou shalt not kill" had been shot away from the wall in the court room and proceeding with "never mind, I'll just fire away" (Who are pro-capital punishment again? That's right, right-wing Christians!)
And those were just the most glaring anti-republican jokes. Mostly, the script was more subtle, with the anti-liberal jokes, the racism and the homophobia so clumsily presented they were, in our opinion, most likely meant to make fun of republican propaganda.
Are we overestimating both the filmmakers and their intended audience? Or have we truly understood the deeper meaning of An American Carol? I'm so confused, I don't know whether to grade it one or ten. I'll have to go with five.
Rallybrudar (2008)
Good performances from supporting cast can't save this mess
Darned comments form won't let me write in Swedish. Will do my best though...
I wonder how this script found its way to the screen. I also wonder if all Swedish reviewers have gone collectively bonkers. An average of 2,75 at bioprogrammet.nu is incomprehensible.
There really isn't anything wrong with the storyline. You can sort of sense a good film hidden somewhere beyond. It's the 60's, there's Ulla who likes rallying and who wants to go professional, there's prejudices to fight and there's the ultimate success. Add a few good songs, some beautiful scenery an some montages into the mix. Doesn't sound too bad, right? Wrong.
Ulla wants to be a rally driver. Someone else (the whole cast, of which some get to say it twice or more) says it's not for women. This is repeated every three minutes.
Ulla is harassed by a tobacco chewing redneck, whose vocabulary is restricted to "Ulla" and the very naughty Swedish word that rhymes with it, who wants prove he's a better driver than her. This is repeated every ten minutes.
Ulla and her co-driver have problems. The co-driver doesn't want to co-drive at all. Then she wants to. Then she doesn't. Then she wants to. This is repeated every five minutes.
To spice things up a little bit there are two Conflicts. One with a mean representative for Citroen, who at first strangely enough signs the girls up to drive for Citroen, then even more strangely sabotages their car, and then strangely turns back into a jolly chap come the final scene.
The other one concerns a perfectly likable veterinarian who suddenly turns into a Bad Guy. That was most likely decided half way through the filming, perhaps when the director realized the potential of actor Per Graffman.
Also, the dialogue in some scenes is cringe-worthy.
But it's not a complete failure. Maria Lundqvist and Johan Hedenberg resist the amateurish direction and give excellent performances. That's when you sense what this film might have been, and right then you might feel a little bit cheated.