Bloody Nordic Mafia Comedy is Audience Fave at Berlin Midpoint
Shootout at the Norskie Corral is grand Finale of Snowplow Opera "in Order of Disappearance". Old Bruno Ganz is still full of P. and V. and Skarsgard is literally awesome.
"In Order of Disappearance" (Kraftidioten, or "Power freaks" in German) is the surprise of the week at Berlin. Stellan Skarsgård is a snowplow driver who will stop at nothing to reap revenge on his son's druglord killers in this wildly ribtickling Norwegian crime thriller. In a followup to his sympathetic listener in Nymphomaniac senior Swede thespian Skarsgård is suddenly a powerful star presence at age 61. Elderly Swiss actor Bruno Ganz, now 71, also amuses as an unlikely gun-toting Serbian Mafia godfather. The film title is a take-off on the familiar cast credit introduction: "in order of appearance". In this film the cast members are not named at the beginnning, but as each one is knocked off in creatively brutal gangland fashion the name appears ~ in order if disappearance! ~ on a black screen as a death notice, with a small cross -- in one case, a Star of David as one of the victims happens to be Jewish (Horowitz). The body count is enough to fill the entire screen at the end -- nearly everybody who appears gets killed and disappears.
Not only is this a rip-roaring actioner but also a heady satire of right wing politics, left wing politics, especially the socialist welfare state, and the very conventions of the Godfather genre. For example, the main villain is a tall handsome clean cut leading man type who is a practicing vegan and has all his henchman drinking bio fruit juices. Graf is a totally callous killer but weeps tenderly when his his own son is kidnapped. This picture has it all, fast action, thrills and spills in a breathtaking setting of arctic snowscapes, raw and subtle humor, terrific deadpan acting, high concept everything and was applauded wildly for something like ten minutes at the end. In my book this should be the Golden Bear hands down with Stellan Skarsgård a shoo in for best festival actor with two outstanding performances back to back -- this and Nymphomaniac. However Berlin is not noted for awarding crowd pleasers, no matter how well made. Morose depressers with unknown actors destined for quick oblivion have a much better chance for prizes here -- however, as a certain Dirty Harry might say, "In Order of Disappearance" made my day and justified suffering through two other soporifics on festival day number 6.
Alain Resnais's "Aimer, Boire, et Chanter" (aka, "The Life of Riley") is endless theatrical ennui aimed at the geritol set and elicited heavy walkouts at the Friedrich Palace screening following Kraftidioten. However, those unconditional fans of the 92 year old deacon of French director's, Resnais -- a living legend in his own time since many a year ago at Marienbad -- those who stuck it out, got their money's worth.
Pierce Brosnan gives it the old college try in "A Long Way Down" but this supposedly "heart-warming" Hornby suicide tract -- by jumping off a tall building at a single bound -- itself falls rather flat on its face as a motion picture ... it put me to sleep but I suspect that diehard Brosnan fans probably got their money's worth ...
