User reviews

We are living in a Golden Age concerning Danish films. One didn't think Susanne Bier would get into the Dogma genre, but there she is now.

This is really good. There's a loving couple, where the man is badly hurt in a car accident and becomes lame, with all the complications, also sexually of course, this means. It wasn't the driver's fault, but she feels guilty and her husband tries to comfort the girl. But the comfort goes much too far.

This is about big feelings, but Bier leads you right into them, without rushing away from you. The acting is absolutely brilliant, especially the plain virtuosity from Paprika Steen and Mads Mikkelsen. I've seen more than 50 films this year, but this might be the best one. Strongly recommended!

I am not very much into dogma movies - but this one is really worth looking. As always, the danish acting is superb (by the way: can anybody explain me, why actors from Denmark are so convincing every time?) I also liked the open ending, which doesn't pretend to find a solution to a nearly unsolvable problem. Furthermore, the beginning was gorgeous. Susanne Bier presents her characters in slightly normal situations - but yet that charming and vivid, you just have to love the young couple. And so you also will suffer from the incident and its consequences for them. Another interesting aspect is, that there is absolutely no antagonist in this movie - and, surprise, surprise: you won't miss one! All the characters have two sides, are protagonist and antagonist at the same time - just like in real life!

This movie has a sober sense of tragic : It shows how life is fragile and uncontrollable, whether it is a young couple passionately in love hit by a terrible accident or a double-kid mature couple whose husband will be unfaithful to his wife. The cleverness of the story-telling lies in the fact that the two stories are highly intertwined and all through movie you find yourself recognising everything the characters struggle through. You want to judge them but you are left with you own guilt without any conclusion fro the film. The documentary-style and the dogme do not prevail over the meaning and even give some realistic strength to the beautiful acting. To sum up : a simple tale of two destinies where tragedy reveal our fragility and love can redeem guilt. (7 out Of 10)

Another one of those small Euro digital films that explores human emotion so much better than the mega-bucks equivalents from the States.

When a loving couples unity is shattered by a horrific road accident that cripples the boyfriend, the story explores how a moment can destroy a lifetime or create alternate paths. Superbly acted with deep pathos and unflinching torment, I have yet to see a better performance this year of a female lead. You leave the cinema questioning how the happiest moment in your life can be stolen in a blink of an eye. Life is fragile and all too brief. Not a minute should be wasted.

Halfway through Open Hearts, it becomes more obvious that you're watching a fictional account. The plot becomes slightly predictable, which is a good thing. For the most part, this new Danish film feels like a reality documentary and pulls you in like reality itself. Director Susanne Bier follows the technical requirements to earn a Dogme 95 certification, which means the film has to be devoid of any unnatural camera movement, lighting and sound among other rules. As a result, Open Hearts is also devoid of superficial movie cliches and full of heartfelt human situations.

The film follows a young, newly?engaged couple and a married couple with kids, whose lives are interrupted and complicated by a road accident. Bier stays clear of the external effects of the drama and instead focuses on the characters' inner effects. Her protagonists lose emotional control and appear ill?equipped to handle the consequences of an unexpected tragedy. The film's appeal is not only universal, but timely as well, shattering the modern belief that everything is controllable. Once tragedy strikes, our lives seem far more fragile than we thought.

Stephan Paschalides

Having just watched this film, I had to write something. Totally stunned by the film and its depth. The acting was superb, with totally believable characters involved with an amazing script. I would rate this as probably the most impacting film I have watched. I would recommend watching this film with a loved one. Don't miss any chance to watch this.

The music score is first class, and fits exactly with the tone of the film. Having not seen the actors before, my next task will be to find out what else they and the director have been involved with, in the hope that another gem exists of similar quality.

Dogme movement (1995-2005) is a terra incognita for me, although now it has officially existed only as a terminology thanks to the ubiquitous evasion of shooting on location with any cellphones or other hand-held lighter gizmos, and its spirit has been ingested by more advanced mutants (e.g. mumblecore). But Susanne Bier is not merely a Dogme enthusiast, AFTER THE WEDDING (2006 7/10) is a redoubtable relationship dissection and OPEN HEARTS (the new Hannibal Mads Mikkelsen star in both films) treads the same territory to examine the complexity of humans' conundrum between desire and responsibility, ethics and emotions.

Two couples, one is engaged, another has 3 children, a car accident (not entirely abides by the Dogme rules though) turns their worlds upside down, a threat is common-or-garden both in the cinematic and real world; the life-changing mishap prompts an adultery between a middle class doctor and the disheartened fiancée, whose fiancé undergoes a permanent quadriplegia from the car accident where the doctor's wife is the offender.

The face-fixated close-ups extensively put those characters under scrutiny for their rational and irrational behaviors, natural light commingles with saturated palette (during the beginning and the ending) and a black & white lens of the blurry and grainy illusory fancy. The cast is sterling, a quartet of tug-of-war from Mikkelsen, Richter, Lie Kass and Steen, a humdrum-weary family man holds his seven-year-itch infatuation to a damsel-in-distress; a comfort-seeker with abiding guilt of abandoning her bed-ridden fiancé; a young paralyzer who ruthlessly deserts his fiancée for his incompetence as a proper man but still hankers for her company; a wife is rueful of her road rage and its tragic repercussions, suddenly devastated by her husband's utter betrayal; Steen's impromptu slapping and Mikkelsen's reaction are among the best on-screen intensified scenes I have even seen, three of the four leads end up in my yearly top 10 list (guess who narrowly missed the spot?).

But on the other hand, the melodramatic core of the story hobbles a soul-searching catharsis and empathetic introspection which would put the film onto an upper notch, Bier and DP Morten Søborg's camera is erratic but not dizzily shaky, the fly-on-the-wall intimacy allows us to take a much closer look at the symptoms and the cause of the frailty resides in every soul on earth, and offers us staying in a paralleled world, munches with palliative pills to ease our own troubles.

Enough has been said about the Dogme rules, and the many movies that have been made with the certificate. No matter if you like the concept or not, Dogme will always ad a great amount of realism into a movie. And in "Elsker Dig Forevigt"/"Open Heart" the realism is very strong. Probably stronger in any of the other Dogme-films I have seen.

Even more realistic the movie gets from the acting, which is outstanding. I found Mads Mikkelsen a bit under-achieving in the beginning, but as the drama gets more intense – so does Mikkelsen. He is Niels, the soft, modern, Danish family-man, who is as good with the kids as he is with his job. Other of Mikkelsen's parts has been very far from that, not least playing Tonny in Refn's "Pusher" and "Pusher II".

The wife of Niels, Marie, is well performed by Paprika Steen. Danish movies have had a reputation (in Denmark) that they are all dull, everyday-dramas with Paprika Steen in a leading role. "Elsker Dig..." has probably played a part in creating this reputation. It's not really fair, firstly because Danish movies are a lot more than that and secondly because Steen is really good. In "Elsker Dig…" she shows great dept in her acting, and in one of the best scenes in the movie Marie's 'house-wife-facade' breaks down, showing that Marie is a lot stronger than what you could have expected. It's a difficult scene, but Steen carries it out very well.

As the third corner stone of the triangle Sonja Richter is the young woman Cæcilie who's boyfriend Joachim (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) is severely injured, when he gets run down by Marie, driving a bit too fast. The performances by Richter and Kaas are as spotless as they are outstanding.

I have to comment on the children in this movie. It rarely works really well, because children aren't actors. But the teenage daughter of Niels and Marie, Stine (Stine Bjerregaard), has a lot to offer. She too has a big scene, again it works, and it's brilliant. The younger brothers, Gustav and Emil, works very good too. These kids aren't 'acting' they are 'living' their parts. Stop casting wonder-kids, and look this way!

This thing is normally not my thing. But still I rated this movie high – because it is a good movie. I generally like realism in movies (which I guess this review unveils) and that is 100% here.

This is the second Susanne Bier film I've watched and I found it to be completely absorbing. It probably didn't need to be a movie and would have been quite suitable as a TV film. As a Dogme movie it mostly worked well though occasionally I thought it used gimmicks, which I thought were perhaps not Dogme in nature. Specifically there was the use of what looked like thermal imaging segments at the beginning and end of the film and I've no idea why. There was also a section near the beginning where characters dialogue was clipped before they had finished speaking and again I didn't know why.

What carries the film is the acting and characterisation and, apart from the odd weird choices already mentioned, the Dogme style of filming serves the story very well, drawing you in as a viewer and not distracting you with flashy directorial flourishes. I read someone complaining that it didn't make sense to dispense with the language of film that has been built up over years and years but this stripped back approach makes perfect sense to me for the right story.

It isn't perfect but it's much better than the average mainstream film. I thought the ending was a little weak. It seemed right to leave the resolution ambiguous but, for me, it wasn't quite ambiguous enough. I also thought Niels' wife was much more attractive than the Caecilie character he falls in love with but that's probably just me!

A girl whose boyfriend went paraplegic because of a car crash falls in love with the husband of the woman that ran her fiancée over. Though the plot may look like a twisted soap opera the fact is that the movie of Akeson & Olesen is such an intense and wise portrait of human emotions. Feeling of guilt, love, infidelity... no flowery stuff and no useless decorations. "Open hearts" is a piece of life.

Despite the directors probe to know their job their movie wouldn't be the same without the impressive work of the extraordinary actors she chose. Propably none of them will won an Oscar, and they're not very popular, but they'd deserve to be big stars.

Another great contribution of DOGMA movement to last decade's cinema.

*My rate: 9/10

A Bergmanesque study of a marriage that is turned upsidedown by one part mishap and one part momentary lapse of reason. What's provocative here, and makes for an intelligent and moving film, is the way in which the spurned wife (played with quiet dignity by the estimable Paprika Steen) doesn't dish up deserved revenge, quivering hatred or physical or mental violence. but, rather, offers an attempt to understand, to accept, and to hold the family together regardless. How rare is this? The line that stays with me - and it's a casual aside but one that cuts straight to the bone - is Paprika telling her husband's mistress that `we can't even afford' the new furniture he has lavished on her.

Once the film hits its groove, its DOGME origins are forgotten and we're left with intimacy and the thousand and one little tragedies that unfold on any given day of any given week. It could be said to be modest in scope, somewhat uninventive in form, and it does immerse itself uncritically in the middle class milieu (and in this respect, I would liken it to Moretti's `La Stanza del Figlio' - except that film does seem to express a suppressed distaste for Berlusconi's Italy), but there's an honesty and maturity that make it a valuable experience - particularly for any teenager used to a soap opera diet of hysterical marriage operatics. or for anyone still recovering from `Festen'.

At its best, and there's a frisson of that here, DOGME-95 has delivered fresh slices of life (or, to elaborate, privileges a panorama of personal battles against a recognisably familiar backdrop) - its Vows of Chastity whittling the camera down to something akin to a microscope.

A real feel-good mov... yeah, maybe not!

'Open Hearts' is actually a film that doesn't really evoke many thoughts in my head. It's a solid watch, the story is standout and the acting is more than satisfactory. Apart from that, I don't have much elese to say, to be honest.

Sonja Richter and Mads Mikkelsen are very good together in this, as are Paprika Steen and Nikolaj Lie Kaas in fairness. The whole plot that they are all involved in is rather depressing, the relationship between Richter's Cecilie and Mikkelsen's Joachim is uncomforting to see unfold. Stine Bjerregaard's character is annoyingly used (just there to twist the story) but the Bjerregaard herself does do well.

I will say that I didn't overly like the editing/camera work, though that's pretty much only early on as it becomes less noticeable as the film ticks by. That's the only real negative that I have.

I have never been a fan of Dogme style film making. To me it means jittery frames due to the use of hand-held cameras, little background music, and often grainy images. But 'Open Hearts' is one big exception.

The story is about forbidden love. There are plenty of miserable people in this film and yet there are no 'bad' people here. Mads Mikkelsen delivered one of his strongest performance by portraying the tormented lover. He was a good man - a practising doctor, a caring father and husband to his children and wife. Yet he fell in love, madly and beyond his control, with a younger woman who was traumatized by a recent accident. I can totally relate to his agony and sentiment - not being able to remove her from his mind every single waking minute, while fully knowing his obligation to his family.

The film concludes without offering a feel-good ending, as life often does. I was left to think about it, and to muse over the dilemma faced by the characters. It made me think for a long time.

I strongly recommend this film to anyone who enjoys European cinema. And if you are a romantic, you should not miss it.

In the first ten minutes of Open Hearts I had no idea what was coming. When the inciting incident occurred I was shocked and sad. I never expected for that to happen, and didn't know where the movie might go next. But then Mads Mikkelsen entered and after one conversation with Sonja Richter I knew exactly where this movie was going. In fact, I stopped the video and said "Oh great, so it's one of those movies." Two days later I returned to the film and suffered through the rest. I hate movies about infidelity with a passion, particularly when the characters in the protagonist roles are the ones who get involved in the affair. Then I find myself hating the protagonists and feeling sorry for everyone else who is hurt by their actions. By the way, this is only a spoiler if you don't look at the poster for the movie (or the DVD cover, or any image advertising the film whatsoever.) There's simply nothing good or enjoyable about Open Hearts. It is just an exercise in misery and doesn't even take advantage of an interesting setup to explore how horrible life events can break down relationships that seemed strong enough to survive anything. It's just a relationship drama that made me mad for 2 hours.

As an amateur movie watcher I don't know much and I care even less at this point about visual effects and studio gimmicks, and I didn't even know about the 95 manifesto until I read some of the reviews for this title; instead, what I care about is the story and the message it sends, how and indeed if it manages to do so, and how the actors act. And for all those, this is a masterpiece.

This is a story about how life gets, the message is that love just happens, it just happens to some of us at the weirdest of times, and, if one cares to understand this, it's for the better, while if they don't, they will just suffer anyway. It is not the first Susanne Bier film I see and this is the sort of message she knows how to convey.

As for the acting, it is brilliant. Just thank God for Mads Mikkelsen. If you like this actor, see Open Hearts today! There is at least one scene which you will rewind. More than once.

I'm not going to explain what the rules of Dogme 95 actually are. If you want to know them, you can look for it on the internet. All I want to say about it is that they were made by Lars Von Trier and that should already be enough for the people who know something about European cinema, to know what this movie will be like. Fact is that I like the concept behind the Dogme 95 movies, even though the directors don't always follow the rules very strictly. The main reason why I like them is because they make honest and truthful movies. Not using any big explosions or big action shots, the stories and the acting are the main stars in these movies and that's something that you won't find very often in a Hollywood production.

In this movie we follow several people whose lives are devastated after one incident. Cecilie's life seems to be perfect, she is happy and will soon marry with her fiancé Joachim. But than he is seriously injured in a car accident, caused by Marie. He is paralyzed from the neck down and all he can do is talk and eat. Because he can't cope with that, he tells Cecilie that he never wants to see her again, breaking her hearth several times, just to be sure that she will never ever return to him. In the hospital where Joachim is treated, Cecilie meets Niels, a doctor at the hospital and Marie's husband. He offers Cecilie to help her in this difficult times, but it doesn't take long before they fall in love and start an affair, which of course breaks up Niels' family...

I'm a great fan of European cinema and in my opinion the Scandinavian movies are one of the best. They know very well how to make movies that don't seem very complicated or original at first, but that will blow you away once you have seen it all. And it's exactly the same with "Elsker dig for evigt" It's very hard not to be touched by it and I really wouldn't understand it if there are many people who don't like it.

Next to the good story I also liked the acting. Like so often with Scandinavian actors, I haven't heard of most of them before, but they give away an excellent performance. Add to this some nice camera work and you know that you've got a movie that should be seen by a larger public. This isn't a very complicated movie, but the story is very recognizable and touching, making it an easy accessible movie. But don't be mistaken by it. It will, without any doubt, have a deep impact on you once you've seen it. And I'm pretty sure that many people will have difficulties to keep their eyes dry from time to time. Anyway, I really liked this movie and in my opinion it doesn't deserve a score lower than 7.5/10. Even an 8/10 isn't too high for this movie if you ask me.