Daylight

Funny how someone described it as a "TV like" movie (what ever that means). Many European, actually all non-American, films do not rely strongly on aimless action sequences and special effects and zoom in on the story. Therefore they keep a steady pace, convincing real life characters and the story is mainly told through image appose to spoon fed by dialogue. They're less "loud" This story is well thought through, original with twisting plots. Superb acting by the international known cast (yes people there was a time when Monique and Derek were killin' it out there) and throat grabbing drama and suspense. See it if you can.

It's about when love turns evil. An attorney inadvertently finds out she has an autistic brother. Her mother has kept him under wraps for decades. He's serving time for murder. When she visits him she decides he's innocent. After some investigation into the matter she decides to spring him. She talks her boss at the law firm into taking the pro bono case and she's off! It's got some cliches that get a little tired, like everybody telling her to not investigate the matter any further, to what end people? Some of them, yes, they are heavily invested but only about half the people who try to thwart her investigation are. Other than that it's a great story using the device that the inmate can't speak for himself.

Screenwriters in all countries can learn a lesson from this remarkable thriller. Plot, characters, suspense and an indefinable quality, humanity.

Watching this film not only kept me guessing, even though you have a vague idea of where it is going, in a way that keeps you on edge until the very end. Sure, some of the "thriller" aspects are not up to the budgets of the best of Hollywood, but they work to the extent needed here.

The actors are top notch (though I doubt there are may hunks like Bo as hospital orderlies) and Fedja van Huêt, as Ray, in particular, does an excellent turn in his role.

If you want a thriller with something more, see this movie.

I must admit: Being north of 60, I've become jaded to the plethora of mediocre films that had been released over the past 20 or 30 years. They all seem to be cheap rehashes of prior films, created to make a quick buck from the continuously endless parade of streaming sites that be.

Daglicht (Daylight) took me by surprise because I wasn't expecting anything other than a run-of-the-mill Nordic noir. Perhaps I'm biased because I'm also autistic like a few of the characters in Daylight, but special mention should be made that the filmmakers did portray autism fairly accurately.

Also, I was surprised by the strong relation this film had to Rain Man. You can almost call this a Danish Rain Man given its similarities.

Like a lot of Scandinavian noir, the atmosphere was perfect as well as the pacing, music and direction. Was some of the acting a bit over the top? Maybe. Hollywood is also guilty of making sure you can tell someone is autistic from a mile away. Nevertheless, Daylight is worth the two hours spent watching it and I look forward to more films from the creators.

What worked: It's a well executed thriller, keeping the viewers on the edge of their seat till the last minute of the movie. It's twisted, plot gets interesting and keeps us guessing what the next scenes of the movie it is going to be. It's an interesting and engaging watch. It might deserve a second watch to grasp the complexity of the series of events that's happening in the movie. What did not work: -Plotholes, unanswered questions : many questions in the movie are not answered, some just skipped and some not covered. What we expect ,once so many complexities are set up in the movie , is a satisfying conclusion and answered to if not all but most of the curiosities. The movie gets interesting but the final moments of the movie did not grasp the intensity and the impact that it should have established. Some final moments seemed rushed and some not covered. As a result, makes the movie an enjoyable watch but not a complete one. Final verdict: recommended