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THE FILMS OF RUBEN ÖSTLUND
TOURING RETROSPECTIVE
JANUARY–MARCH 2015 **** EXTENDED THROUGH APRIL 14
PLAY (2011)
PLAY
2011, 118m, Sweden/France/Denmark
Swedish with English Subtitles
with Anas Abdirahman, Sebastian Blycker, Yannick Diakité, Sebastian Hegmar, Abdiaziz Hilowle, Nana Manu, John Ortiz, Kevin Vaz
cinematography: Marius Dybwad Brandrud; produced by Erik Hemmendorff (also co-writer of screenplay)
“I want to make the audience active and reflective,” Östlund has stated. He does just that with this controversial record, inspired by actual court cases, of five black teenagers harassing white and Asian youths through scams and role-playing. All violence is implied, but the graver implication (which inflamed critics on the home front) is that political correctness debilitates society, as “good people” stand by and do nothing for fear of being thought racist. Östlund, who won a Swedish Oscar for Best Director and a “Coup de coeur” prize at Cannes, imprisons his actors within a frame, not unlike our social mores freezing us in place. Unabashedly impolite, Play offers food for thought and fuel for fury.
FORCE MAJEURE (Turist, 2014)
An avalanche in the French Alps sends a father scurrying for his life, leaving behind his panicked wife and children, in Östlund’s examination of the conflict between social role and survival instinct.
PLAY (2011)
Unabashedly impolite, Östlund’s record of racially charged harassment and societal paralysis offers food for thought and fuel for fury.
INCIDENT BY A BANK (Händelse vid bank, 2009)
Based on an actual account of a bank robbery witnessed by two bystanders across the street, Östlund’s concise study of surveillance may remind some viewers of Michael Haneke’s Caché.
INVOLUNTARY (De ofrivilliga, 2008)
Described by Östlund as “a tragic comedy or a comic tragedy,” the director’s second feature draws uneasy laughter through five examinations of bourgeois group dynamics.
AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SCENE NUMBER 6882 (Scen nr: 6882 ur mitt liv, 2005)
A young man has second thoughts about his boast to jump from a bridge in this penetrating critique of peer pressure and the fragile male psyche.
GITARRMONGOT (2004)
Östlund’s mostly nonprofessional cast brings a documentary quality to this compassionate, humorous portrait of outsiders and nonconformists, focusing in particular on the titular musician, a young man facing dire obstacles in life.
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