Allegro (2005) or, His Past Was Lost in a Copenhagen Zone!

8/30/2013

Allegro (2005) or, His Past Was Lost in a Copenhagen Zone!

♥♥♥♥

Ulrich Thomsen's oppressed figure looms large in red on this elegant poster for Christoffer Boe's Allegro

Zetterstrøm, a famous Danish pianist, is invited to Copenhagen from his new life in New York by a man, who says that the pianist's past has been stolen, and that it is hidden inside a vacuum in the city, which is called the Zone.

Allegro is written by Mikael Wulff (Pandaerne (2011-12)) and co-writer/director Christoffer Boe (Everything Will Be Fine/Alting Bliver Godt Igen (2010)). Deeply mysterious and aesthetically fixated, - with lovely photography by Manual Alberto Claro (Melancholia (2011)) - Allegro is very reminiscent of director Christoffer Boe's preceding film, his debut Reconstruction (2003): Once again we are in Copenhagen, where a knotty man and a beautiful woman meet and find themselves caught in a single, fantastic device. The narrative seems more outreaching in Reconstruction, however, and I also had some difficulty here in believing Helena Christensen (Chris Isaak: Wicked Game (2001), music video) falling for Ulrich Thomsen's (Banshee (2013-16)) seemingly wood-carved, charmless man, our protagonist.
Allegro is beautiful and original, but it speaks more to the brain than to the heart.
SPOILER The Zone turns out to be a box, which Zetterstrøm has created himself for storing all the things that he doesn't want to be reminded of, (that is, his past), and he can only open the box, once he learns to trust another person's love.

Watch a trailer for the film with Spanish subtitles here

Cost: Reportedly 10 mil. DKK, approximately 1.57 mil. $
Box office: Unknown - but seemingly less than 2 mil. DKK, approximately 0.31 mil. $
= Box office disaster (approximately 0.2 times the cost)
[Allegro premiered 25 August (Copenhagen International Film Festival) and runs 88 minutes. Shooting took place in Copenhagen, Denmark, and in New York. The film opened #124 in 1 theater to a tiny 505 $ first weekend in North America, where it peaked at #88, only played that one cinema and grossed 7k $. The only other market listed at Box Office Mojo is Brazil with 2k $. Allegro sold a measly 13,825 tickets in Denmark, which should rake in approximately 1 mil. DKK. - This was after a record first half of 2005, in which Danish films held an impressive 33 % market share of the home cinema market. The film won 1/5 Robert nominations (Denmark's Oscar). Boe returned with Offscreen (2006). Thomsen returned in The Virgin Queen (2006, miniseries) and theatrically in Clash of Egos/Sprængfarlig Bombe (2006). Supermodel Christensen returned in The Christmas Party/Julefrokosten (2009). Allegro is fresh at 63 % with a 6/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Allegro?

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

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8/30/2013

Allegro (2005) or, His Past Was Lost in a Copenhagen Zone!

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