When his mother, who has sheltered him his entire 40 years, dies, Elling, a sensitive, would-be poet, is sent to live in a state institution. There he meets Kjell Bjarne, a gentle giant and... See full summary »
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Elisabeth leaves her abusive and drunken husband Rolf, she packs her bags, takes the kids and goes to her brother Göran. The year is 1975 and Göran lives in a commune called Together. ... See full summary »
Director:
Lukas Moodysson
Stars:
Lisa Lindgren,
Michael Nyqvist,
Emma Samuelsson
Satirical comedy follows the machinations of Big Tobacco's chief spokesman, Nick Naylor, who spins on behalf of cigarettes while trying to remain a role model for his twelve-year-old son.
When his only friend dies, a man born with dwarfism moves to rural New Jersey to live a life of solitude, only to meet a chatty hot dog vendor and a woman dealing with her own personal loss.
Director:
Thomas McCarthy
Stars:
Peter Dinklage,
Paul Benjamin,
Bobby Cannavale
A young Jewish American man endeavors to find the woman who saved his grandfather during World War II in a Ukrainian village, that was ultimately razed by the Nazis, with the help of an eccentric local.
Director:
Liev Schreiber
Stars:
Eugene Hutz,
Elijah Wood,
Jonathan Safran Foer
Svend and Bjarne work for a butcher in a small Danish town. Fed up with their boss' arrogance, they decide to start their own butcher shop. After dismal beginnings, an unfortunate accident ... See full summary »
Director:
Anders Thomas Jensen
Stars:
Nikolaj Lie Kaas,
Mads Mikkelsen,
Line Kruse
Based on the true childhood experiences of Noah Baumbach and his brother, The Squid and the Whale tells the touching story of two young boys dealing with their parents' divorce in Brooklyn in the 1980s.
When his mother, who has sheltered him his entire 40 years, dies, Elling, a sensitive, would-be poet, is sent to live in a state institution. There he meets Kjell Bjarne, a gentle giant and female-obsessed virgin in his 40s. After two years, the men are released and provided with a state-funded apartment and stipend with the hope they will be able to live on their own. Initially, the simple act of going around the corner for groceries is a challenge. Through a friendship born of desperate dependence, the skittish Elling and the boisterous, would-be lover of women, Kjell Bjarne, discover they can not only survive on the outside, they can thrive. But as their courage grows, the two find oddball ways to cope with society, striking up the most peculiar friendships in the most unlikely places. Written by
Sujit R. Varma
Sven Nordin who played one of the leading roles in this movie gained 25 pounds to fit the character he was playing. See more »
Quotes
[Ticket ordering continued]
Train ticket salesman:
That'll be 130 kroner per ticket.
Elling:
130 kroner? The last time mother and I took the train to Larvik the ticket cost 25.
Train ticket salesman:
That must have been about 30 years ago.
Elling:
Yes
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I quite liked this movie because it gives a good characterisation of two socially insane people trying to live a normal life in their own flat after they have been locked up in a institution the last two years. Per Christian Ellefsen is very good as the prudish old maid Elling, and Sven Nordin also made me laugh several times as Elling's friend Kjell-Bjarne who is crazy about women. Elling himself discovers after a while that he is a poet, and starts to write poems which he lays in packets of sour cabbage and he then places the packages back in the store, waiting for someone to buy them.
Some of the most funny scenes in this movies is to see how this crazy persons try to deal with situations which normal persons do not think twice about, but these two persons have two battle with themselves to manage an easy thing as answering a phone call.
However, both Elling and his friend Kjell-Bjarne both reach their goals at the end, Kjell-Bjarne gets himself a woman, and someone reads one of Elling's poems.
I considered this movie to be very funny when I saw it, and I certainly hope that someone will make a sequel two it. I have not yet read any of Ingvar Ambjørnsens books about Elling, but maybe I will do so in the future. However, "Elling" is an entertaining movie which mentions serious problems in a humorous way. I will recommend it for everyone who does not need to see braindead action-movies, and I also hope that this movie will be welcomed be foreign critics. This movie does certainly deserve to be shown in other countries than Norway!
8 of 11 people found this review helpful.
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I quite liked this movie because it gives a good characterisation of two socially insane people trying to live a normal life in their own flat after they have been locked up in a institution the last two years. Per Christian Ellefsen is very good as the prudish old maid Elling, and Sven Nordin also made me laugh several times as Elling's friend Kjell-Bjarne who is crazy about women. Elling himself discovers after a while that he is a poet, and starts to write poems which he lays in packets of sour cabbage and he then places the packages back in the store, waiting for someone to buy them.
Some of the most funny scenes in this movies is to see how this crazy persons try to deal with situations which normal persons do not think twice about, but these two persons have two battle with themselves to manage an easy thing as answering a phone call.
However, both Elling and his friend Kjell-Bjarne both reach their goals at the end, Kjell-Bjarne gets himself a woman, and someone reads one of Elling's poems.
I considered this movie to be very funny when I saw it, and I certainly hope that someone will make a sequel two it. I have not yet read any of Ingvar Ambjørnsens books about Elling, but maybe I will do so in the future. However, "Elling" is an entertaining movie which mentions serious problems in a humorous way. I will recommend it for everyone who does not need to see braindead action-movies, and I also hope that this movie will be welcomed be foreign critics. This movie does certainly deserve to be shown in other countries than Norway!