| SiGN UP! join
the DigsNews mailing list + we'll keep you posted about updates and other DIGS-related news .
|
|
|
|
| ..
|
rented
any good movies lately?
jump
to the
boards
and recommend it.
|
copyright ©1999-2002
DigsMagazine.com.
|
 |
flick pick
| Together
2000
Directed + written by: Lukas
Moodysson
Starring: Lisa Lindgren, Michael Nyqvist, Emma Samuelsson, Sam
Kessel, Gustav Hammarsten
Language: English
Look for it at the video store under: foreign [Sweden]
Watch it when you’re in the mood
for
something: nostalgic,
whimsical
The critic says:
 ½/
5 the rating system
explained
Fun factor: /5 |
|
Plot synopsis
In 1975 Sweden, Göran lives
in the Together commune along with his lover Lena, and a handful of
other leftist idealists. Among these are a bank president’s son turned
radical communist revolutionary, a couple who are hell-bent on
protecting their child from the evils of that well-known capitalist
Pippi Longstocking, a born-again militant feminist lesbian named Anna,
her charmingly cynical, estranged husband Lasse, and Klas, the shy
suburban-mom-coiffed man who loves Lasse. Despite all the peace, love
and harmony that the Together folk espouse, there’s an awful lot of
bickering that goes on at the house, as the inhabitants struggle with
open relationships, jealous exes, and whether everyone’s putting in
their fair share of time with that dreaded chore of washing dishes. One
night, Göran gets a phone call from his sister Elisabeth, who’s in
tears because her alcoholic husband has just hit her for the second time
in the span of their marriage, and she’s decided to make sure it’s
the last by leaving him. Göran picks up Elisabeth, in a psychedelic VW
van of course, and brings his sister, along with her two children, Eva
and Stefan, to live at the Together house. All of which only serve to
further the troubles in the less-than-idyllic commune.
Review If
Show Me Love and Together
are any indication, Lukas Moodysson just might be the Cameron Crowe of
Swedish cinema, possessing the amazing ability to create truly
feel-good, funny movies that nonetheless, never threaten to make you ill
from sugar-syrup overload. What makes Moodyson’s films just a little
bit more challenging than your average Crowe crowd-pleaser is that you
sort of get the sense he’s not particularly aiming to create
characters that end up being as lovable as they are. With Together,
especially, it’s hard to have much sympathy for these characters
initially. Göran’s a doormat, so busy spouting off the niceties he
thinks he’s supposed to spout as the perfect open-minded hippie, that
you can’t help but feel that he has no one to blame but himself when
he lets his Lena walk all over his feelings. Elisabeth brings her kids
to the commune and barely notices that Stefan’s pissed-off that he’s
been ripped away from his dad, or that adolescent Eva’s freaked
into near-silence by the open sexual vibe in the house. And Elisabeth’s
plumber husband is just a loser, who’s not so much a mean wife-beater
as he is a miserable alcoholic who can’t do anything right. These are
not lovable characters, cute though hapless; they’re seriously flawed,
seriously real people, working hard to just plain be happy, which is
what makes their eventual redemption so satisfying. In the end, it’s
the diehard ideologues that remain miserable and alone, too blinded by
the idealism of their extremist views and insistent upon the inferiority
of all those that disagree to realize that in this world, it’s a lot
easier to achieve that ideal of happiness once you accept that neither
life, nor love, are ever perfect and pure.
—reviewed by
Y. Sun
--------------------------->
lounge . nourish
. host .
laze
. home .
|
