frank-boester
A rejoint le févr. 2009
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Note de frank-boester
This movie was the most important ticket for me at the Berlin International Film Festival 2025. Having seen the director's movie "Sex" the year before, I couldn't wait what part two of his trilogy had in store.
While "Sex" was an intelligent, amusing and touching exploriaion of our expectations of desire and gender roles, "Drommer" touches deeply on infatuation and sour sweet tribulations of (first) love.
I predict that everyone who's ever been crazy in love will think back during this film...and find eternal themes.
Recently I read some (justified) criticism of how film dialogue in productions of streaming services is often highly implausible and unnatural. An ongoing trend, unfortunately...
Author/director Dag Johan Haugerud has an incredible knack for putting words into his characters mouths and inner monologues that are as entertaining as they are human and life-like.
Not a spoiler, but I feel the need to advise that the movie starts with quite an amount of narration over the first scenes. Please don't be put off by it - "Drommer" is really worth your attention!
While "Sex" was an intelligent, amusing and touching exploriaion of our expectations of desire and gender roles, "Drommer" touches deeply on infatuation and sour sweet tribulations of (first) love.
I predict that everyone who's ever been crazy in love will think back during this film...and find eternal themes.
Recently I read some (justified) criticism of how film dialogue in productions of streaming services is often highly implausible and unnatural. An ongoing trend, unfortunately...
Author/director Dag Johan Haugerud has an incredible knack for putting words into his characters mouths and inner monologues that are as entertaining as they are human and life-like.
Not a spoiler, but I feel the need to advise that the movie starts with quite an amount of narration over the first scenes. Please don't be put off by it - "Drommer" is really worth your attention!
Seen this at the Berlin International Film Festival.
She was about to unleash the film on us, as the noticeably excited director finally exulted, having been brought on stage beforehand by the screenings moderator. The Cinderella tale was very close to her heart, and she almost spoiled the ending (more on that below). But first things first:
At the beginning, we still wonder, due to the emerging, subtly crude exaggeration, where this journey is headed... whether the film will find its tone. Yet another patchwork family coming together, a few centuries before today.
The penniless widow Rebekka moves with her daughters, Alma and Elvira, into the estate of a supposedly wealthy, older suitor, who has a pretty daughter named Agnes. Unfortunately, the hoped-for benefactor soon passes away. When it also turns out that this household has fallen on hard times as well, the newly widowed and aspiring social climber finds herself in a tough spot.
The prince of the county, meanwhile, is idolized by all the maidens for his poetry-and is soon to host a ball where he will choose his bride. A rivalry ignites between the initially haughty Agnes and the unconventionally attractive Elvira, spurred on by mother Rebekka, who puts every hockey mom to shame. After all, the pool of candidates is as large as in today's casting shows.
The audience may soon suspect: The daughter figures and the "evil" stepmother from the original Cinderella story seem here to serve merely as a foundation. For things appear to be taking a different turn, won't they? Who is the good one, who is the bad one-we recall the director's words: "The ugly stepdaughter, that was me." "There is only one Cinderella, we can't all be her."
Here, one feels pleasantly uncertain about how it will all end. It is crafty how Emilie Blichfeldt (both director and writer) blurs boundaries and plays with expectations, even as she does not shy away from clichés but rather embraces them in keeping with the genre.
The parallels to today, which Emilie Blichfeldt hints at, meaning that the whole thing can also be read as an analogy to current and burgeoning social dreams - are not as far-fetched as they may seem. After all, influencers, beauty ideals, body optimization trends, posing coaching, the excesses of cosmetic procedures, and (model) casting shows all promise dreams that rarely come true.
The drastic visual shock effects in "Den Stygge Stesøsteren" do not come across as mere sensationalism; instead, they powerfully illustrate the delusions of the characters: losing weight by ingesting a parasite, a nose job with hammer and chisel, self-mutilation... These scenes provoked intense reactions from the audience: vehement groans, followed by sudden bursts of laughter-even applause for individual scenes. Rare and strange.
And yet, it is simply faithful to the source: fairy tales have always drawn their effect from horrific deeds. The Grimm version of the story, as one can find, is by no means the only one. The Cinderella legend haunted Europe for centuries in countless variations before the Brothers Grimm-and later Ludwig Bechstein-shaped it into the form we remember today.
It is hard to imagine a better or more faithful adaptation of fairy tale motifs for a modern audience than what this film achieves-through adaptation, interpolation, and remixing.
She was about to unleash the film on us, as the noticeably excited director finally exulted, having been brought on stage beforehand by the screenings moderator. The Cinderella tale was very close to her heart, and she almost spoiled the ending (more on that below). But first things first:
At the beginning, we still wonder, due to the emerging, subtly crude exaggeration, where this journey is headed... whether the film will find its tone. Yet another patchwork family coming together, a few centuries before today.
The penniless widow Rebekka moves with her daughters, Alma and Elvira, into the estate of a supposedly wealthy, older suitor, who has a pretty daughter named Agnes. Unfortunately, the hoped-for benefactor soon passes away. When it also turns out that this household has fallen on hard times as well, the newly widowed and aspiring social climber finds herself in a tough spot.
The prince of the county, meanwhile, is idolized by all the maidens for his poetry-and is soon to host a ball where he will choose his bride. A rivalry ignites between the initially haughty Agnes and the unconventionally attractive Elvira, spurred on by mother Rebekka, who puts every hockey mom to shame. After all, the pool of candidates is as large as in today's casting shows.
The audience may soon suspect: The daughter figures and the "evil" stepmother from the original Cinderella story seem here to serve merely as a foundation. For things appear to be taking a different turn, won't they? Who is the good one, who is the bad one-we recall the director's words: "The ugly stepdaughter, that was me." "There is only one Cinderella, we can't all be her."
Here, one feels pleasantly uncertain about how it will all end. It is crafty how Emilie Blichfeldt (both director and writer) blurs boundaries and plays with expectations, even as she does not shy away from clichés but rather embraces them in keeping with the genre.
The parallels to today, which Emilie Blichfeldt hints at, meaning that the whole thing can also be read as an analogy to current and burgeoning social dreams - are not as far-fetched as they may seem. After all, influencers, beauty ideals, body optimization trends, posing coaching, the excesses of cosmetic procedures, and (model) casting shows all promise dreams that rarely come true.
The drastic visual shock effects in "Den Stygge Stesøsteren" do not come across as mere sensationalism; instead, they powerfully illustrate the delusions of the characters: losing weight by ingesting a parasite, a nose job with hammer and chisel, self-mutilation... These scenes provoked intense reactions from the audience: vehement groans, followed by sudden bursts of laughter-even applause for individual scenes. Rare and strange.
And yet, it is simply faithful to the source: fairy tales have always drawn their effect from horrific deeds. The Grimm version of the story, as one can find, is by no means the only one. The Cinderella legend haunted Europe for centuries in countless variations before the Brothers Grimm-and later Ludwig Bechstein-shaped it into the form we remember today.
It is hard to imagine a better or more faithful adaptation of fairy tale motifs for a modern audience than what this film achieves-through adaptation, interpolation, and remixing.