A 6 y.o. Inuit boy runs off a snowy roof in Copenhagen and dies. Smilla, a half Inuit who lives in the building and knows the boy, looks into it. What makes an acrophobic boy run up on the roof? The clues take her to Greenland.
The beginning of the 20th century. Gertrud and Ingmar are in love with each other. While Ingmar is away during the winter, a religious wave spreads in the area. Also Gertrud becomes a ... See full summary »
Director:
Bille August
Stars:
Maria Bonnevie,
Ulf Friberg,
Pernilla August
Swedish composer/conductor Martin and concertmaster Barbara fall in love. After their divorces, they're happily married. While composing an opera, Martin is diagnosed with Alzheimer's. It slowly changes him.
Director:
Bille August
Stars:
Sven Wollter,
Viveka Seldahl,
Reine Brynolfsson
The film centers on a big Polish family. Jadzia is the mother and the ruler of the Pzoniak family (she has five children). Though she's happily married to Bolek, she is also having a ... See full summary »
One of the greatest love stories of the twentieth century, the sexually charged affair of trailblazing female set designer Aline Bernstein and iconic American writer Thomas Wolfe in the 1920s before Wolfe's untimely death.
Swiss Professor Raimund Gregorius (Jeremy Irons) abandons his lectures and buttoned-down life to embark on a thrilling adventure that will take him on a journey to the very heart of himself.
The story of Ingmar Bergman's parents. In 1909, poor, idealistic theology student Henrik Bergman falls in love with Anna Åkerbloom, the intelligent, educated daughter of a rich family in ... See full summary »
Director:
Bille August
Stars:
Samuel Fröler,
Pernilla August,
Max von Sydow
A beautiful young dentist (Ormond) working in a tough British prison starts to become attracted to a violent inmate (Roth) after the break-up of her marriage, and embarks upon an illicit ... See full summary »
Denmark, 1963: Teenagers Bjørn and Erik are into girls and being in a band helps Bjørn meet Anna. Erik likes Kirsten but she likes Bjørn. Having a mentally ill mom at home also ruins Erik's chances. Anna's pregnancy changes everything.
Director:
Bille August
Stars:
Adam Tønsberg,
Lars Simonsen,
Camilla Søeberg
Based on Peter Hoeg's bestseller, this film is set in snowy Copenhagen where a small boy is found dead after he fell off a roof. Smilla Jasperson, a close friend who lives in the same house begins to suspect murder because she knows that the boy was afraid of heights and would not have played on the roof. As she begins to investigate, she is pulled deeper and deeper into a conspiracy that could very well mean her death.Written by
Harald Mayr <marvin@bike.augusta.de>
Richard Harris played King Arthur in Camelot (1967), and Julia Ormond played Guinevere in First Knight (1995). See more »
Goofs
When Smilla's father shows her the X-rays of the worms in the heart, he points out what remains of the liver and lower esophagus, then says "This is the heart, what's left of it". He's actually pointing to an upside-down X-ray of the upper abdomen. The "heart" is actually bowel gas in the intestine. See more »
Quotes
Smilla:
The only thing that makes me truly happy is mathematics. Snow, ice, and numbers.
See more »
Bille August's "Smilla's Sense of Snow" starts off with great promise. An opening sequence that's a terrific hook segues into an introduction of the character of Smilla Jasperson, played perfectly by the lovely Julia Ormond. Smilla is self-isolated, deeply unhappy, and unapproachable. Her only real friend is the young Inuit boy, Isaiah, who dies suddenly under suspicious circumstances, and Smilla determines to uncover the reasons for his death. For the first two reels, this film is a terrific mystery story with good pacing, fine acting, and evocative cinematography. Characters with uncertain motives come and go as the story unfolds, most played by a fine stable of talented actors. But then in the third reel, the film collapses. I'm not talking about a slow descent into mediocrity here; I'm talking about a precipitous nosedive. Out of the blue, the story suddenly switches to an action/thriller format that is poorly written, directed, and edited. New, undeveloped characters are suddenly thrown into the mix, each a deus ex machina as the increasingly unrealistic plot requires. The film's denouement, in which the underlying mystery is revealed, is so scientifically ridiculous both in terms of biology and especially in physics that I felt thoroughly cheated. It's as if the entire enterprise were rushed to completion due to a looming shortage of time, money, and interest. What a pity. Even so, the first two thirds of the film stand up well on their own, and my rating is based on that. Rating: 7/10.
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Bille August's "Smilla's Sense of Snow" starts off with great promise. An opening sequence that's a terrific hook segues into an introduction of the character of Smilla Jasperson, played perfectly by the lovely Julia Ormond. Smilla is self-isolated, deeply unhappy, and unapproachable. Her only real friend is the young Inuit boy, Isaiah, who dies suddenly under suspicious circumstances, and Smilla determines to uncover the reasons for his death. For the first two reels, this film is a terrific mystery story with good pacing, fine acting, and evocative cinematography. Characters with uncertain motives come and go as the story unfolds, most played by a fine stable of talented actors. But then in the third reel, the film collapses. I'm not talking about a slow descent into mediocrity here; I'm talking about a precipitous nosedive. Out of the blue, the story suddenly switches to an action/thriller format that is poorly written, directed, and edited. New, undeveloped characters are suddenly thrown into the mix, each a deus ex machina as the increasingly unrealistic plot requires. The film's denouement, in which the underlying mystery is revealed, is so scientifically ridiculous both in terms of biology and especially in physics that I felt thoroughly cheated. It's as if the entire enterprise were rushed to completion due to a looming shortage of time, money, and interest. What a pity. Even so, the first two thirds of the film stand up well on their own, and my rating is based on that. Rating: 7/10.