You, the Living

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You, the Living
Directed by Roy Andersson
Produced by Philippe Bober
Written by Roy Andersson
Starring Jessika Lundberg
Björn Englund
Fred Anderson
Cinematography Gustav Danielsson
Release date(s) 24 May 2007 (Cannes Film Festival)
21 September 2007 (Sweden)
Country Sweden
Language Swedish
IMDb profile

You, the Living (Swe: Du levande) is a 2007 film by Swedish director Roy Andersson. It premiered at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, as part of the Un Certain Regard selection [1].

The film is an exploration on the "grandeur of existence"[2], centered around the lives of an overweight woman, a disgruntled psychiatrist, a heart broken groupie, a carpenter, a business consultant, an elementary school teacher with emotional issues and her rug selling husband, among others.

Shot in an unconventional manner, it consists of a fluent succession of exactly 50 short sketches, each filmed in one take. Most of them have a tragicomic undertone. It utilizes a combination of alienating techniques such as presenting the characters in grim make-up and having them talk to the camera, turning them into vessels for the message of the movie.

The film won the audience award at the 2008 Gothenburg Film Festival.[3]

Contents

[edit] Plot

Some of the stories connect loosely, but the real connection is the function of all the characters being essentially human, and developing the themes of life, existence and happiness.

some of the stories of the movie are the following:

  • A overweight woman laments her life while being completely self-absorbed
  • A carpenter (Leif Larsson) has a dream where he is condemned and executed for breaking a 200 year old china set.
  • A pickpocket (Waldemar Nowak) steals the wallet of a high roller at a fine restaurant before he has paid the bill.
  • A psychiatrist (Håkan Angser) has lost faith in people's ability to be happy because of their selfishness.
  • A business consultant (Olle Olson) gets his hair butchered by an upset barber (Kemal Sen) before attending a meeting where the CEO (Bengt C.W. Carlsson) dies of a heart attack.
  • A tuba player (Björn Englund) saves money by playing in funerals, including the one of the CEO.
  • A girl (Jessika Lundberg) finds her musical idol, Micke Larsson (Eric Bäckman) in a tavern, he invites her and her friend a drink but afterwards he gives her false directions for a band rehearsal.
  • Husband and wife (Pär Fredriksson and Jessica Nilsson) affect their respective jobs lingering about a fight they had.

Throughout the film a number of ideas are explored repeatedly. One of these leitmotifs is the concept of dreams, and how they reflect the humanity, fears, feelings and desires of the characters. Another is the use of music, in conjunction with dialogues and editing, both as a track and performed on camera, the movie starts with a monologue which ends up being rapped to Nordic folk music, which is being played by lone musicians each in different rooms in different parts of the city.

[edit] Production

With a budget of over five million euros, the movie took three years to make. "It is not the shooting itself that takes time, but the work on creating the environments. We built almost all the sets in the studio, even those which took place outdoors. Most of the time we started from Roy's sketches", said Johan Carlsson, production manager.

Most of the film was shot in Sweden but the film was a co-production between Sweden, France, Germany, Denmark and Norway. Eighteen different organizations were involved in financing the production.[4]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Selection at Cannes Film Festival
  2. ^ Roy Andersson section at the official website
  3. ^ Gunnar Rehlin (2008-01-28). ‘Living’ nabs Gothenburg award. Variety. Retrieved on 2008-02-05.
  4. ^ Production section of the website. Retrieved on 2008-03-22.

[edit] External links

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