The Idealist/Idealisten (2015) - Thrilling Cold War true story scandal served by Rosendahl and Co.

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The Danish and American flags melt together on this tension-establishing poster for Christina Rosendahl's The Idealist

A radio journalist in Eastern Jutland, Denmark in 1988 latches himself onto a story, which will henceforth define his career: The crash of a US B52 airplane carrying four thermonuclear bombs in Greenland back in 1968, - at a time in which the enormous Northern territory was supposed to be free of nuclear weapons, and the secret aftermath of the affair, in which a large groups of Danes cleaned up the mess and got seriously ill.

 

The Idealist is written by Lars Kristian Andersen (Flame & Citron/Flammen & Citronen (2008)), Simon Pasternak (Sex, Drugs & Taxation/Spies & Glistrup (2013)), Birgitte Stærmose (Camino (2023)) and great Danish filmmaker, co-writer/director Christina Rosendahl (Supervoksen (2006)). It is based on the actual Thule base scandal.

Rosendahl and Co. have weaved together a surprisingly good and very debate-opening Cold War film here, a journalistic drama with grand political and principal perspectives more so than a thriller perhaps, but it is terrifically thrilling nevertheless, especially for Danes and Greenlanders. But really the conflict here with a giant allied super power in a bind in relation to basically a lilliput nation has much wider relevance, and the lies and weapons race during the Cold War has frightening perspectives and consequences the world over.

Peter Plaugborg (Ditte & Louise (2015-16)) is excellent as Brink, the energetic, idealistic and naive journalist protagonist; and so is Søren Malling (The Promised Land/Bastarden (2023)) as the leader of the clean-up workers, who collaborates with him. Smaller parts are also handled with the foremost professionalism by both Danes and Americans. The story is very large, and it goes around the Greenlanders' position in the matter. In the same way, it remains unclear how Brink in the first case gets onto the scandalous story. The Idealist is still impressively made and exceedingly well edited.

 

Related posts:

 

Christina Rosendahl: 2020 in films - according to Film Excess

The Good Traitor/Vores Mand i Amerika (2020) - Tenderness and no-nonsense Danish and world history meet in great Rosendahl war drama 

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 20.5 mil. DKK, approximately 2.88 mil. $

Box office: 372k $

= Box office disaster (returned 0.12 times its cost)

[The Idealist premiered 19 March (Nuuk, Greenland) and runs 114 minutes. The film disappointed at the Danish box office, selling only 39,661 tickets, coming to 372k $. The film was also released in Norway, Brazil and Argentina, likely with tiny results, as these are not reported at Box Office Mojo, where the Danish result figures. The film won 1/10 Robert award nominations, (Denmark's Oscar). Rosendahl returned with Vold i Kærlighedens Navn (2017, documentary) and theatrically with Vores Mand i Amerika (2020). Plaugborg and Malling both returned in The Shamer's Daughter/Skammerens Datter (2015). 1.6k+ IMDb users have given The Idealist a 6.9/10 average rating.]

What do you think of The Idealist?

Shorta (2020) - Debuting duo Hviid/Ølholm's intense Danish ghetto blast

♥♥♥♥♥

 

+ 2nd Best Movie of the Year

+ Best Action Movie of the Year + Best Debut Movie of the Year + Best Fight Scene of the Year: The laundry room fight + Best Poster of the Year 

 

A heavily equipped cop stands on a vandalized police car during a stylized sundown on this poster for Frederik Louis Hviid and Anders Ølholm's Shorta

 

A rookie cop gets partnered up for patrol with a seasoned 'conflict specialist' colleague and against orders the two venture into the tense ghetto neighborhood, where a recent violent arrest has brought tempers up to the boiling point.

 

Shorta is written and directed by debuting great Danish filmmakers Frederik Louis Hviid (Follow the Money/Bedrag (2019)) and Anders Ølholm (Ækte Vare (2014, writer)).

The story opens with a moment from the arrest that results in the hospitalization of the young man from the ghetto, a scene that seems inspired by the tragic George Floyd arrest and death in Minneapolis, Minnesota in May 2020, - but the scene was written and shot long before that time. What follows is a story of strife, conflict, crime and ghetto problems, racism vs. hatred of authorities and the police especially, a reflection of reality unfortunately, which takes a Danish context and problem and amplifies it.

Hviid and Ølholm do so with clear role-models in Training Day (2001) and John Carpenter movies such as Assault on Precinct 13 (1976) and Escape from New York (1981), and the result is a heady brew of testosterone-laced low-budget action full of adrenaline, great dialog and dedicated performances:

Simon Sears (The Exception/Undtagelsen (2019)) is good as the conflicted younger policeman who takes a mostly passive approach to the wrongs of his colleagues but gets pushed to reckon with himself here. Jacob Lohmann (The Rain (2018-19)) goes through a lot in Shorta, which makes good use of his bull-ish physique. Debuting Tarek Zayat impresses as young Amos, a boy who gets arrested for a misdemeanor and becomes a kind of hostage/helper to the two cops as they get lost in enemy territory.

Despite the film's violent action-aspirations, the filmmakers keep it real and related to issues that will be relatable to those living in or near ghetto areas: The unprovoked and demeaning public personal search of a young man; recruitment of children and teenagers to gangs, the struggle against that; the hardening and tribe mentality in both the gang and police cultures; the downwards spiral of a neighborhood; the mother's anxiousness for her children and so on, - Shorta successfully incorporates it all with winning performances all around.

The film ends a bit abruptly, and I would have liked an epilogue fade-out scene from say a week or a month after the events in the film. But this doesn't rock the fact that Shorta is a thrilling and rare feat that shouldn't be missed in the cinema.

 

Related post:

 

2020 in films - according to Film Excess

 

Watch a 2-minute clip from the film here

 

Cost: Unknown

Box office: In excess of 1 mil. $

= Uncertain

[Shorta premiered 5 September (Venice Film Festival) and runs 108 minutes. Hviid and Ølholm began working on the project 6 years before its release. Shooting took place in Denmark. The Svalegården neighborhood portrayed in the film is fictional. The film has sold 87,775 tickets in Denmark in its first nearly 3 weeks, coming to a roughly 1 mil. $ gross. The release is negatively affected by the China Virus pandemic, which is closing down thousands of cinemas in Europe. The film is set to open in film festivals in Lithuania and Sweden in November. Hviid and Ølholm do not have their next project announced yet. Lohmann returns in Retfærdighedens Ryttere (2020); Sears in Shadow and Bone (TV-series, post-production); Zayat does not have another gig yet, (and is studying law in Copenhagen.) 329 IMDb users have given Shorta a 7.5/10 average rating.]

What do you think of Shorta?