Drømmer

Norwegian films are on the rise. Just a few years ago a film from Norway was a rarity and the Norwegian film industry was small compared to their neighbors Sweden and Denmark. Hitchhiking on the success of Joachim Trier directors such as Erik Poppe and Dag Johan Haugerud also released successful films in recent years.

"Dreams" was the final episode in the Oslo trilogy of Haugerud that I saw. The Oslo trilogy of Haugerud was inspired by the "Three colors" trilogy (1993 - 1994) of Krzysztof Kieslowski and must be distinghuised from the trilogy of the same name by Joachim Trier.

The Oslo trilogy consists of the episodes "Sex', "Love" and "Dreams". Each episode highlights (sexual) relationships from an alternative / liberal angle. "Sex" was a bit too alternative for me. "Love" in which one lead character develops from changing sexual contacts to monogamous and the other lead character the other way round was better. "Dreams" is in my opinion the best episode of the trilogy.

In "Dreams" a teenager falls in love with her teacher. The film is less about what really happens in this relationship and more about the reaction of relatives (mother and grandmother) of the teenager.

The film portrays the relationship more or less as just a puppy love while in general a relationship between pupil and teacher is deemed unethical and unprofessional. That the portrayel in "Dreams" is nevertheless convincing depends I think in no small measure to the fact that both characters are female. A relationship between a male teacher and a female pupil would have been regarded far more toxic.

Funny thing is that in "Love" a similar thing happens in a relationship between doctor and patient. In this instance both characters were male.

Just as in the other episodes "Dreams" spent lots of (screen) time at the portrayel of Oslo. Walks from one home to the other are used to portray the different neighborhoods of Oslo without contributing much to the overall story. The images are beautiful so it didn't disturb me.

Last but not least do notice the symbolic way in which staircases are used.

This may carry a lot. More than the Golden Bear!

You can see it as a coming of age movie, an unrequited love story, a queer one, a real test of how emotions tremble in different life stages or a unique story about the ambiguity of art & literature production but it disastrously failed whatsoever!

I tried hard to find the exact word to describe my feelings towards the first hour and I found it to be ANGRY! I was really angry. I was about to quit it.

Is that an audiobook?!

There are few moments when I thank God that he will leave me a space to start looking deeply at his characters and feeling their emotions but he soon stabbed me with another hefty monologues.

I found out at the end that Mr. Haugerud is originally a novelist.

This is how not to make a movie with narration. It's not the same way of writing novels, I swear!

This could be a real gem if the narrator shut the f* up & let us feel. (and remove that pretentious scene of the nan climbing the ladder)

Shout out to the teenager 👏 She is a good actress.

I have no intention to watch the other parts in the trilogy nor to watch a movie chosen by Todd Haynes!

But at least, I learned a new way of making tea.

I watched the screening during the Berlinale. The audience was 70% women of all ages and the audience had many scenes where we were laughing and cheering. The way the story is told allows the audience to drift in, like the characters and be very attentive. At the same time, the different generations get challenged to reflect and admit the lack of liberty in thinking and feeling. It is an amazing movie about feeling without pathos. And the actresses are amazing by all groups and characters. Truly a golden bear and also a movie that exemplifies how coming of age is often a box that is diminished by critics. This a coming at life movie.

Dreams, a film that won the Golden Bear at Berlin Film Festival and directed by Dag Johan Haugerud, a Norwegian filmmaker. It is an intimate portrayal of a 17 old high school student who gets infatuated with her French teacher. She writes her experiences in detail. She first shows them to her grandmother who is a poet. The grandmother feels she has to show them to her daughter, the mother of the girl. Her mother and grandmother have wildly different reactions to her intimate and explicit words. The film is a meditation of love, attraction , family relationships, coming of age story of a teenager and also the creative process of writing.

One of the highlights for me was the discussion of the movie Flashdance between the mother and the grandmother.

Strong acting, great dialogue and music make the film a very thought provoking art piece. I really liked it.

On the surface, this film is about a Norwegian teenage girl who falls in love with her school teacher and becomes obsessed with her crush. However, deep down, it has more layers to that: we can see various examples of how the so-called "objective reality" is perceived by us humans so differently and can lead to misunderstandings or conflicts but also serve as inspiration for literature or art. Drømmer is about this subjective reality of "my vision" of the world, the problems it might cause but also about the acceptance of this phenomenon however embarrassing its side effects could be.

Deep, subtle, thought-provoking.