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Ásgeir H. Ingólfsson wrote:
On the last day of the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, the awards of the smaller juries were announced – more specifically the FIPRESCI Critics Prize, the European Film Label Prize and the Cathedral Jury Prize – and Elskling, directed by Lilja Ingólfsdóttir, swept them all, winning three times. That evening, the main awards ceremony took place, with Helga Guren being chosen as the Best Actress. The film itself won the Special Jury Prize, which is actually the Silver Medal, and was the first film in the festival’s history to win a total of five awards.
This was no surprise. The biggest surprise was that it didn’t win a major award – because I can’t remember any film in my hometown in the eleven years of attending this festival being followed by such a long standing ovation. Thousands of viewers continued to cheer for the Norwegian divorce drama from a Norwegian-Icelandic director.
Before we go further, it’s worth explaining who Lilja is. She is the daughter of Ingólf Margeirsson, who seemed to be the author of all the biographies published when I was a child, and Tone Myklebost, who has translated more than 50 Icelandic books into Norwegian, by authors including Sjón, Jón Kalman, Einar Karason, Einar Má, Auði Áva, Gerði Kristnýja, Gyrði and Laxness – who recently earned the name Falconer for her translations. Lilja spent the first ten years of her life alternating between Norway and Iceland, but has since lived mainly in Norway, studying filmmaking in London and Prague. This is the first feature film, following more than 20 shorts.
But it’s hard to describe exactly what makes this movie so amazing. It’s light and fun at first. When Maria and Sigmund work together, we feel the romance. She’s the one who takes the initiative. Maria is insecure and arrogant at the same time, which is some strange combination that Helga Guren has created.
Then we fast forward seven years and a few kids later. The happiness seems to be there, but something starts to get to her. We see the little things slowly turn into something big, too hard to overcome. But we also get the sense that there are things we can’t see – because Maria herself doesn’t want to see them. This is first and foremost her story, her journey – and as time goes on, she begins to better realize how deep it all goes. It’s not just about the relationship.
It turns out that she’s lucky enough to meet a very skilled psychologist who seems to know what she’s doing, but she certainly would have been better off if she had contacted him sooner. From this comes one of the most memorable scenes in the film: her showdown with her mother. Then you realize that the trauma goes back a long way. It’s a genetic trauma, and Maria knows she has to break the chain – a series of traumas that the women in the family have inherited from each other.
I really don’t know how to say the title correctly in Icelandic. Loveable is a logical translation – but the English title Loveable also captures the essence – worthy of love. This is what Maria must first convince herself of.
But is anyone to blame? The film manages to dance artistically along that narrow single stage. Both seem equally responsible for the difficulties of the marriage, but also in life. It seems an impossible puzzle, especially for two artists who are both contractors. While one is given something to do, the other is forced to stay home and take care of the children and the baby – and it turns out that she is the one who never gets the chance to pursue her dreams, never gets the chance to realize them. Time – First of all, she is always tired. Tired of a world that lies to you about the possibility of love and other dreams – but at the same time creates a system that seems to make it nearly impossible for both to achieve. There are simply not enough hours in the day to do it.
What makes the film so successful is the beautifully detailed cinematography, the well-woven text, the wonderful performances from the entire cast and the leading lady, Helga Guren. Helga is the film’s biggest trump card, a force of nature who easily keeps you hooked, even in the same scene, with her face changing regularly as the emotions fluctuate. She is a true force of nature in this role and her scenes in the song “Mountaineers”, sung by Norwegian Susanne Sundfør and Icelander John Grant, are truly stunning.
As mentioned above, Helga deservedly won the Best Actress award. But the best main actors were two; Dutch actors Ton Kas and Guido Pollemans for their performances in the film. Three days of fish （Three days of fishing). And I understand the jury, I myself imagine she could win the acting prize, if you can only choose between them – so it’s better to skip the choice and just give them both a crystal ball. They play father and son in the film. Cass plays the father who retires to Portugal, and Polemance plays the middle-aged son who is in a very irrational state and seems very lost in life.
The father is on his annual medical visit in the Netherlands, but he’s thinking of moving everything to Portugal – you can sense that the son is having a hard time. He insists that his father be guaranteed to come home at least once a year. This is a film that turns the traditional father-son film on its head, with the father fleeing the nest and the son staying – and their characters don’t fit the script. Usually, the son is closed off, hiding, and the father is the one who’s more willing to talk about feelings – but at the same time you get the sense that it took him a long time to get to this point. These are late-maturing males in that respect. After all, they never express this longing and all these latent, unresolved emotions – but it’s all too obvious on their faces and in all their gestures. The film is literally about the three days they spend together, visiting their sister and uncle and the doctor and the dentist, wandering from one place to another. You get the sense that existence itself is valuable for both parties, even as both long for something deeper. At the same time, you think this can be chalked up to this image of Icelanders, coming from a generation whose parents fled to the Canary Islands to pad their pensions.
But finally it was time for the winning photo itself. Mark Cousins is a regular at the festival. I was there interview He was told about The Eyes of Orson Welles, as he was a member of the jury and had seen it before. Stockholm my love at this festival. It has to be said that both films are much better than his winner this year, A Glimpse. I myself am more positive than most people I meet – it’s safe to say that this win came as a surprise to most people.
Cousins makes essay films and discovers variations of this form. Here, he talks about British artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, or “Willy,” as she’s called, and begins to wonder who this old woman in several photographs is. He encourages us to look closely and ignore our own prejudices.
Later we see her as a young woman. We see her art and fellow travelers, things we only hear about from living art historians. Cousins excels at creating life in stills. So far these have been his own reflections, and the material can be sparse in nature. This is an artist who Cousins feels has long been neglected, especially in her later life, but who has been rediscovered to some extent in recent years.
He tells how a hike to the Grindelwald Glacier in Switzerland marked a turning point in her life. She spent the rest of her life capturing the colors and shapes she found in the glacier, whose core is now shrinking. While others looked up, she looked down at the glacier’s core, at the material it was made of. But even if we try to look closely, Cousins can never truly understand the mind of this extraordinary woman. Since Wilhelmina died 20 years ago, it seems that there needs to be better material or a better method, or even just more footage.
Then we went to the final party where we met Lilja, Helga and Mark and of course the jury who started the party with a few dance moves, and now I saw Sjón dancing with Geoffrey Rush. This is exactly how any decent film festival should end. I will tell you more about how she started in the next column.
Ásgeir H. Ingólfsson is a poet, journalist and translator.
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