Seen at the 21st Portland International Film Festival
FILM TITLE: THE OTHER SIDE OF SUNDAY DIRECTOR: BERIT NESHEIM COUNTRY: NORWAY 1996 CINEMATOGRAPHY: ARNE BORSHEIM MUSIC: GEIR BOHREN, BENT ASERUD CAST: Marie Theisen, Bjorn Sundquist, Hildegunn Riise SUPER FEATURES: Somber, but positively ended Christian tale.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
THE OTHER SIDE OF SUNDAY, was one of the Final Nominees for the Foreign Film Oscar. And it made its first Portland appearance in this 21st Portland Film Festival, so others would get a chance to see this interesting, not really great, but very well written film, that really wants to make a serious point, despite its opinionated nature.
The subject matter itself, is a tired one, specially for American standards, and it really leaves one with only one thing left... what is it like in other places? We know through Ingmar Bergman that these things are till strong, and that fundamentalists had a very strong hold on their flocks for many years, in that area, and if this film is any indication, it is extended into Norway as well.... not that we really want to mix film and reality, but why would anyone try it, right? One can guess that the problem still exists, although the film points to the 50's.
The story is that of Marie, who is growing as a teenager, and is finding herself in the midst of many pranks by other fellow students, who pick on her as she is the priest's daughter, and quite naive. She befriends a Mrs. Tunheim, who is the caretaker of the church, and they become friends, where Marie learns a few things here and there.... like about makeup and a little different hair style, even some earrings.
As Marie grows, her innocence begins disappearing, and she starts doing things with a few of the other girls in the school. In one outing, it appears that the other two friends of hers are ready for sex, and Marie, is the odd one out. All of this, just adds to Marie's rebellion, and she begins slowly by comfronting her father, at first regarding her younger brother's flatulence, and later about lies. In both cases she gets slapped hard. But one thing is clear, Marie is beginning to win the battle, and she has not planned to give up, like some of her friends have already done.
And in the end, Mrs. Tunheim kills herself, apparently she has waited all her life for Marie's father, and has been a faithful mistress in all that time, and he has not come through. His own wife's illness has not helped things much, although it is not clear in the film if this relationship involves anything beyond some intimacy. This is hard for Marie, but it is the liberating force she really needed. Her father has been a bit of a hypocrite in the pulpit, and she now has a chance to shine on the father, and does so with a really nice of earrings, that Johannes obviously recognizes. The daughter knows, and he knows that she knows.
The film ends with the young Marie stepping out on her own... she has fled the coop. Unlike most other girls, who never got over their guilt feelings, for whatever they decided to do, and eventually became pure Christians, Marie never quit on herself, or what he knew to be an obvious sham, and nothing but a control game.
The best part of this film is the viciousness it attacks Christianity with, in just a few well placed lines... the film treads quietly until the moment for each line, and these situations are never set up in a way that we can expect. Well, sort of. We know that they sit up at the dinner table every night, we just don't know what is going to happen, and that's when things tend to get out of hand. But the real loser in all these confrontations is the Johannes, who is, in the end, noticing that his own way has broken up what he thought was a happy family.... one that he does not really love, it seems, although he claims that it is his duty to do so... once again, ogligated to do something, rather than wanting to be a part of it. This is what the film is about, all the way through it, and us, in the audience, as Americans, can only sit back and applaud that Marie makes it, rather than fall by wayside like so many others have. While, from a film making stand point there is little that makes this film special, still, in topic and design it is a nice one. The filming, or the print, seem to be washed out, and there never really is any sunshine in the film, with the exception of one moment... the ending shot. This stark feeling permeates the whole film, and does make it a bit dreary and heavy, and at times rather slow. But it is all from Marie's point of view, really, which is akin to this feeling... but one need not take it literally, I don't think.
Enjoyable in all this, is the way that the young girls are growing. While it appears that a few of them are winning on Marie, they really are not. They just had the opportunity which Marie did not. But, in the end, this opportunity does not amount to a hill of beans, and all the girls that crossed the line, to find out what the new world was all about, had pretty much repented and gone back to the old world of the Christian design. Which is to say, that Marie did it right, until she knew that she had the freedom to take such a jump, and not worry about her parents, or anyone else. All the other girls do not have this intelligence, and come off as dolls, by comparison.
A good film, depending too much on the dialogue to make its point. But the chances it creates for its venom, are excellent, and really break through well.
3.5 of 5 GIBLOONS Reviewed by Pedro Sena. Copyright (c) Pedro Sena 1998. All Rights Reserved.
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