Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: A Funny Man/Dirch (2011) - Kaas shines in serious biopic of Danish national treasure comedian

5/14/2015

A Funny Man/Dirch (2011) - Kaas shines in serious biopic of Danish national treasure comedian

♥♥♥♥

1 Time Film Excess Nominee:

Best Actor: Nikolaj Lie Kaas (lost to Jack Black for Bernie)

The very dark poster for Martin Zandvliet's A Funny Man

QUICK REVIEW:

A Funny Man is a biopic of the life and death of legendary Danish actor-comedian Dirch Passer (It's Nifty in the Navy/Flådens Friske Fyre (1965)), primarily told through the prism of his comedic partnership with Kjeld Petersen (Lars Ranthe (Adam's Apples/Adams Æbler (2005))) as 'Kellerdirk': Trailing times of physical downfall, termination, time solo, dramatic bankruptcy, divorce, reunification, Petersen's death, and Passer's.

Nikolaj Lie Kaas (A Second Chance/En Chance Til (2014)) is outstanding in perhaps the best role of his career; in the eyes of the Danish audiences who are intimately familiar with the beloved man he portrays here, he gradually completely becomes Passer in A Funny Man. He gives it his all, and the show performances, - alone and with Ranthe, - are impressively achieved. - Kudos to the actors and co-writer-director Martin Zandvliet (Angels of Brooklyn (2002))!
A Funny Man is, as Zandvliet's preceding drama Applause/Applaus (2009), also a portrait of the theater world and a strong, burdened performer personality. Passer appears hunted by himself and never as an uncompromising showman in A Funny Man, which, unsurprisingly, drew averse criticism from actor-friends of his still alive, (like Judy Gringer and Morten Grunwald.) Guilt, doubt, lacking self-confidence and wish to perform is instead shown again and again in the Passer of A Funny Man.
Still, I don't feel that we get all around that man in Zandvliet and Anders Frithiof August's (Superclásico (2011)) script. We don't get to know anything about Passer's parentage or his religious side, for instance.
A Funny Man is also niggardly with bigger scenes with extras, perhaps a budget limitation, but in any case, the film could have benefited from a little more verve size-wise.
Zandvliet is busy applying the finishing touches to his next film, the big Danish-German Land of Mine/Under Sandet (2015), a period war film about mines and mine removal.

Related posts:

Martin Zandvliet: 2011 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
Applause/Applaus (2009) - Paprika Steen's struggling Thea

Watch the trailer with English subtitles here

Cost: Unknown
Box office: Unknown
= Unknown
[However, A Funny Man was the biggest Danish movie hit in Denmark in 2011 with 482k admissions. If that made the film financially successful is difficult to say. (It was produced with unknown support from DR and Nordisk Film & TV Fond and 6.5 mil. DKR from DFI.) The film received a small forest of the Danish film prizes of the year; Bodil's for Kaas and Ranthe, audience award for Zandvliet, as well as 6 Robert awards and many other nominations and wins.]

What do you think of A Funny Man?

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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.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

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5/14/2015

A Funny Man/Dirch (2011) - Kaas shines in serious biopic of Danish national treasure comedian

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