MIFUNE (Mifunes sidste sang)
Reviewed by Harvey Karten Sony Pictures Classics Director: Soren Kragh-Jacobsen Writer: Soren Kragh-Jacobsen, Anders Thomas Jensen Cast: Iben Hjeljle, Anders W. Berthelsen, Jesper Asholt, Emil Tarding, Anders Hove, Sofie Brabol, Paprika Steen, Mette Bratlann
The Danes--God bless 'em--put most of Nazi-occupied Europe to shame during The War by cheerfully delivering all their country's Jews from Hitler's morons. It's difficult to see that these marvelous people with their wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen might have flaws. But as Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg have already apprised us with their "The Kingdom" and "Celebration," simply erect walls around people, call the units families, and they suffer from the same dysfunctionality as America's own Lester and Carolyn Burnham.
Soren Kragh-Jacobsen takes on the role of a melancholy Dane as he relates a story that's as darkly humorous as "American Beauty" but perhaps more attuned to a Danish audience--which can catch the subtleties of their own language rather than having to depend on a decent but unpoetic set of English subtitles. Anders Thomas Jensen and Kragh-Jacobsen's tale embraces two themes: one is that you can take the farmer out of the country, but you can't take the country out of the farmer. The other, more resonant, is that the best relationships occur when two people know about each other's sordid pasts (and we all have them, don't we) and yet accept each other for what they are. "Mifunes sidste sang," which translates as "Mifune's Last Song," takes its title from a character played by the late great Japanese actor, Toshiro Mifune, in Akira Kurosawa's monumental "The Seven Samurai." Mifune performs in the role of a man who assumes the title of samurai despite his peasant background. Similarly Kresten (Anders W. Berthelsen), an upwardly mobile man of about 30, marries the boss's daughter Claire (Sofie Grabol) and, passing himself off as a middle-class resident of Copenhagen, conveniently hides from her his own ignoble background.
Not that Kresten is a bad guy. It's just that he comes from lower-class stock in the sticks of Denmark, having been raised in a run-down farmhouse with a few scrawny hens and a mentally challenged brother, Rud (Jesper Asholt). That's not all. His mother had committed suicide without leaving a note, but we can bet that her surroundings played no small part in her decision. Just days after his marriage he gets a call to return home. His dad had died. He must arrange for a decent funeral and, more important, decide what to do with his retarded brother--all the while keeping his wife in the dark about where he was going. Hiring a beautiful housekeeper, Liva (Iben Hjele) to take care of his sibling, he is similarly in the dark about her own background as a hooker. When Liva's snotty brother Bjarke (Emil Tarding) is kicked out of school and joins the group of misfits, the plot get more complicated: funnier and sadder in equal proportions.
"Mifune" is a well-acted tale which purportedly follows the Dogma collective founded by Thomas Vinterberg and Lars von Trier--a film theory that eschews the use of artificial lighting, heavy cranes and equipment, artificial sets, and even music on the soundtrack (unless the music is part of the scene). The philosophy holds that "we can't beat the Americans anyway, so we Europeans should head in another direction." Fortunately, Kragh-Jacobsen doesn't take the dogma ideas too seriously, thus avoiding what could have been the film equivalent of the socialist realism school of the 1930s in the Soviet Union. We do get music, at least one birds'-eye shot, and most important a convincing representation of the madcap adventures of a poor, handsome guy who discovers that lying to your partner leads only to divorce. Find yourself a partner who doesn't care that you got breakfast directly from your own hens or that you turn tricks to help put your brother through a fancy prep school.
"Mifune" shows a bit too much of Rud the rain man, who doesn't have a heck of a lot of variety to his expressions and vocabulary, but aside from that this is an intelligent, passionate, occasionally violent film that throws in some real surprises--like the strange farmhouse visitor who plays flamenco guitar like Carlos Montoya. The picture illustrates an off-again, on-again relationship between Liva and Kresten that will have you rooting for their final get-together while thumbing your nose at the bourgeois wife back in Copenhagen--who's going to miss the massive orgasms that her soon-to-be-divorced husband is graphically shown providing for her. "Mifune" is Denmark's entry into the upcoming Oscar competition for best foreign language film.
Rated R. Running Time: 99 minutes. (C) 2000 Harvey Karten, film_critic@compuserve.com
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