Movie/TV Show Reviews:

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  Do you believe in Santa Claus? Or maybe a thief who steals toys from some children to fulfill the wishes of others? He was the one who sawed off the lock on your bike, thanks to which your brand new road bike was lost. The Christmas style is the perfect scenery for an anti-fairy tale, which is why it ties together the latest film by Anders Thomas Jensen - a master of black humor who believes only in chaos. The director of "Adam's Apples", who laughed at neo-Nazism and the idea of salvation in his memorable film, so that every bite of the screening made us choke, after "Men and Chickens", which was not distributed in Poland, returns with an equally dark comedy. This time it is a story about the erosion of masculinity and unresolved mourning. The creator stages boyish fantasies about how to take over the world without leaving home, except to take part in chases and shootings. At the same time, he absolves his characters, exposes them without any taboos (showing, for example, a man in the middle of a stump with his butt sticking out), and above all, he portrays sensitivity. This is a conciliation session. After "Riders of Justice", even the most hardened feminist will believe in the potential of men's transformation - that is, even the one signed below. It starts with a soldier returning from a mission - will he be sitting in the barn again staring at the wall like a vegetable? his daughter (Andrea Heick Gadeberg) wonders, but then a chain of sudden events sets in motion. Her mother dies in a tragic railway accident, so her father, completely unaccustomed to it, takes care of the adolescent teenager. Being a single parent doesn't last long, because three strange guys knock on the door, who offer him a joint investigation, as well as an apartment. They become a team in no time. The Four Horsemen of Justice are Lucas (Mads Mikkelsen) as a raging bruiser, conspiracy theorist Otto (Nikolaj Lie Kaas), hacker and genius Lennart (Lars Brygmann) and round Ementaler (Nicolas Bro) - a vigilante who once was a victim of bullying. "A couple of extremely intelligent charlatans" proves that neither science, nor the mafia, nor god help with the tragedy. The only thing left is to accept the course of events - the fact that in one frame there are both pain and laughter. Cold green and seething red, the mixture of which colors this film. Gendered within the framework of a revenge movie and crime comedy, he mocks everything that stands in his way: statistical research, start-ups, algorithms, youth for whom psychotherapy is the cure for all evil, jihad that can be blamed for everything , which happens in the Western world, although the perpetrators live in Africa, and finally from the law of force, which gives the advantage to the larger, which is always right. After all, nothing is known for sure and you can't win life like a game of chess. Coincidence is just not enough data? So we will see. Jensen places a bet and conducts an experiment. We watch how a speck of "favorable facts" is enough to create a conspiracy theory, because the world is beautiful when suddenly everything fits. That is why the characters are specialists in biometric face recognition and probability theory - the methods, ridiculed at the beginning, boost the vision of how unpredictable reality is, and at the same time promise to take full control over it. Mads Mikkelsen (are you sure in the main role?) Has not undergone such a transformation for a long time - stuffed, bearded, round - nothing resembles his previous role from "Rauszu". He's a bit Kaecilius from Doctor Strange, a bit One-Eye from Valhalla, and mostly a skinhead from Pusher. He ceases to be handsome, airy and frisky, he grows into the ground as if each of his fingers weighs a ton. The actor does not steal the show from any of the partners, he can hide in the shadows to make other characters stand out. He is not a star for a moment, for there is complete equality. Each character gets the same amount of screen time. This is thanks to the director, who works in a permanent team, building a world in which performers become characters each time, instead of re-disguised familiar faces, as is often the case. Here, not once does one think about the actors' previous roles on the screen. The director started his career early in Dogma 95 and, as a twentysomething, was nominated for an Oscar for his short film, and won it a year later. Since then, Anders Thomas Jensen has been constantly creating films as a screenwriter - and very different ones: "Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself", "Antichrist", "Just After the Wedding", "The Duchess", "In China They Eat Dogs", "Mifune", The Dark Tower and A Wedding in Sorrento. Incredibly hard working in a duet with Lone Scherfig and Susanne Bier. He rarely directs himself, but when he does, the results are as funny, surprising and original as a film about grown men who act like children.

  12/20/2022