Arven (2003)

Director:

Per Fly

Writers:

Per Fly (screenplay) &
Kim Leona (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

9 July 2004 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot:

A young man is torn between his individual hopes and his sense of duty when his father dies and he is expected to take over the family industry.

Plot Keywords:

Father | Steel Factory | Merger | Son | Class Differences

Awards:

17 wins & 6 nominations

Cast

Ulrich Thomsen	...	Christoffer
Lisa Werlinder	...	Maria
Ghita Nørby	...	Annelise
Karina Skands	...	Benedikte
Lars Brygmann	...	Ulrik
Peter Steen	...	Niels
Diana Axelsen	...	Annika
Jesper Christensen	...	Holger Andersen
Ulf Pilgaard	...	Aksel
Dick Kaysø	...	Jens Mønsted
Sarah Juel Werner	...	Marie-Louise
Linda Myrberg	...	Ung skuespillerinde (Young actress)
Lucy Andoraison Hansen	...	Mira
Eric Viala	...	Frederic Rousseau
Valerie Quent	...	Frederic Rousseaus kone (Frederic Rousseau's wife)

Also Known As:

Arvet (Sweden)
Inheritance (Europe: English title)
The Inheritance (Europe: English title)

Runtime:

115 min | Germany:107 min (Filmfest Hamburg)

Country:

Denmark | Sweden | Norway | UK

Language:

Danish | Swedish | French | Norwegian

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Iceland:12 (video rating) | Iceland:10 | Norway:15 | Singapore:R(A) | Sweden:11 | UK:15 | USA:Unrated | Australia:MA | Switzerland:12 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Vaud) | Germany:12

Company:

Zentropa Entertainments

Trivia:

The entire movie was shot with two-camera technique. According to the director this makes it easier to use actor improvisation. Most scenes are also shot with long focal lens. Apart from the visual effect actors did not know where the cameras were.

Goofs:

Errors in geography: In some scenes you can clearly spot that they have been filmed in Malmö, and not in Stockholm where they supposedly take place. For instance are the public transport buses not in "Stockholm" colours and in another scene there is a phone number visible on a shop window, which has the Malmö prefix.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Året der gik 2003 (2003) (TV)

Shakespearean Tragedy Updated to the Family Business

"The Inheritance (Arven)" is the best look since "The Godfather" at the corrosive impact of family business where there's no boundaries between family and business.

The starting premise is strikingly similar to another Scandinavian drama, the Icelandic "The Storm (Hafið)," as in both we start off with a prodigal son happily and romantically involved abroad but forced back to deal with the patriarch's dramatic decision that has ever widening ramifications.

But whereas the first went off in psycho-sexual directions from a fishery, this Danish film stays realistically in the board room of a steel plant as much as the bed room.

Here, his wife is a Shakespearean actress and the Shakespearean references I caught are played up beyond "King Lear,"as the matriarch, a scarily formidable Ghita Nørby, whose role could be taken by Judi Dench or Glenn Close in an American remake, is a Lady MacBeth, and he's baited by a CFO with a pronounced Iago modus operandi, while the wife, the very moving Lisa Werlinder, is left to plead like Portia in "Julius Caeser."

Un-Hamlet-like, Ulrich Thomsen's manipulatable Christoffer plunges into decisions that succeed at high psychological prices for him and those around him, reminding me of the classic closing line of the adaptation of Henry James, "The Heiress": "I've learned from masters."