Mojn
Typically I will look at artwork for Saturday Morning Art Blogging, but today, I’m going to tell you about a movie. First of all, movies can be art, and that’s my link for the purpose of including it in my blogging. Last night, the boyfriend and I went to the Mayan Theater here in Denver to see Terribly Happy, also known as Frygtelig lykkelig, the Danish submission for the 2009 Oscars.
This isn’t my typical type of movie. I didn’t watch the trailer beforehand, and there is a chance that, had I done that, I might not have wanted to go see the film. But, I heard about it briefly on the radio, with the summary “a dark film about the lengths people will go to fit in.”
And that is what it was, but it was also so much much more. Terribly Happy is visually enticing, and beautifully filmed. The shots contrast between bleak open Danish landscapes, full of water, mud and flat grey skies, to tight busy shots of interactions between people, to repeated shots of the visual expressions of the cast of characters. The landscape and the town are desolate, but the minds of the people are active, and in everyone’s business. Nothing goes unnoticed in this small town in South Jutland, Denmark. Far away from Copenhagen, the smallest difference is marked as a glaring fault of those who don’t belong.
After I was asleep last night, still thinking about the movie, I sat bolt-upright in bed and smacked my boyfriend – “The bog! The bog! It’s a symbol! It’s a metaphor!!” In the movie, the bog is the location of vigilante justice, the site of the secrets that are buried in the psyche of the town. At the bog, people and animals get sucked in, and disappear. Likewise, in this small town, the quiet madness of the characters sucks people in, and they either fall into a struggle with trying to maintain their personal truth, or completely losing their minds into the play of endless bleak days.
At times, as a viewer, I was thoroughly irritated with some of the characters for their fatal flaws and obvious bad decision making, and yet – the tension and anxiety throughout the film makes you wonder just what exactly is going on…and at the end, a surprising puppetmaster arises. Who is really pulling the strings?
I highly recommend this film if it is playing near you. It’s a worthwhile hour and 40 minutes. And yes, it’s in Danish, with subtitles.
I laughed my ass off reading this. I know exactly how you feel about being haunted by a movie’s purpose and meaning AND getting so pissed off at how idiotic the charachters can be, and then always calmly remind myself….if they weren’t so stupid this would not be so suspenseful!!! I will try to catch this for sure. I appreciate your words.
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