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The Green Butchers

Original title: De grønne slagtere
  • 20032003
  • RR
  • 1h 40m
IMDb RATING
7.2/10
23K
YOUR RATING
The Green Butchers (2003)
ComedyDrama
Two Danish friends are tired of their employer and open their own butcher shop. An electrician accidentally dies in the freezer and he's sold as marinated chicken and business picks up. What... Read allTwo Danish friends are tired of their employer and open their own butcher shop. An electrician accidentally dies in the freezer and he's sold as marinated chicken and business picks up. What happens when they run out of "chicken"?Two Danish friends are tired of their employer and open their own butcher shop. An electrician accidentally dies in the freezer and he's sold as marinated chicken and business picks up. What happens when they run out of "chicken"?
IMDb RATING
7.2/10
23K
YOUR RATING
  • Director
    • Anders Thomas Jensen
  • Writer
    • Anders Thomas Jensen
  • Stars
    • Nikolaj Lie Kaas
    • Mads Mikkelsen
    • Line Kruse
  • Director
    • Anders Thomas Jensen
  • Writer
    • Anders Thomas Jensen
  • Stars
    • Nikolaj Lie Kaas
    • Mads Mikkelsen
    • Line Kruse
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 42User reviews
    • 19Critic reviews
    • 54Metascore
  • See production, box office & company info
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Awards
      • 7 wins & 8 nominations

    Photos101

    Anders Thomas Jensen in The Green Butchers (2003)
    Line Kruse and Nikolaj Lie Kaas in The Green Butchers (2003)
    Nikolaj Lie Kaas and Mads Mikkelsen in The Green Butchers (2003)
    Nikolaj Lie Kaas and Mads Mikkelsen in The Green Butchers (2003)
    Nikolaj Lie Kaas and Mads Mikkelsen in The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)
    The Green Butchers (2003)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Nikolaj Lie Kaas
    Nikolaj Lie Kaas
    • Bjarne…
    Mads Mikkelsen
    Mads Mikkelsen
    • Svend
    Line Kruse
    • Astrid
    Ole Thestrup
    • Holger
    Bodil Jørgensen
    • Tina
    Aksel Erhardtsen
    • Pastor Villumsen
    • (as Aksel Erhardsen)
    Lily Weiding
    • Fru Juhl
    Nicolas Bro
    Nicolas Bro
    • Hus Hans
    Camilla Bendix
    Camilla Bendix
    • Beate
    Elsebeth Steentoft
    • Ingrid Grith
    Kjeld Nørgaard
    • Leif Larsen
    • (as Keld Nørgaard)
    Peter Reichhardt
    • Levnedsmiddelkontrollen
    Kristian Halken
    • Levnedsmiddelkontrollen
    Lars Ranthe
    • Levnedsmiddelkontrollen
    Mikkel Vadsholt
    • Elektriker
    Søren Thomsen
    • Læge
    Mia Lyhne
    • Journalist
    André Lundemann
    • Kunde
    • Director
      • Anders Thomas Jensen
    • Writer
      • Anders Thomas Jensen
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      Mads Mikkelsen and Nikolaj Lie Kaas had both previously worked with Anders Thomas Jensen on Flickering Lights (2000). They've appeared in all of Jensen's films since then.
    • Quotes

      Svend: Taste this marinade.

      Bjarne: No.

      Svend: Smell this marinade.

      Bjarne: I smoke 20 joints a day. I couldn't smell it if my hair was on fire.

    • Connections
      Featured in De grønne slagtere - en virkelig god marinade (2003)
    • Soundtracks
      Alene med en yndig pige
      Written by Kai Normann Andersen and Børge Müller

      Performed by Poul Reichhardt

    User reviews42

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    A cut above the normal...
    With Green Butchers (aka: De Grønne Slagtere) we are in the territory previously marked out by Sweeney Todd, Eating Raoul, Delicatessen and the like: art house cannibalism. The peculiar flavour of writer-director Anders Thomas Jensen's film is partly explained by this choice of subject, as well as his involvement in the Dogme film movement, having contributed scripts for Mifune (1999), The King is Alive (2000), as well as Open Hearts (2002). The Dogme movement has made a virtue of making films to a strictly naturalistic series of rules, the severity of which, whether entirely serious or not, was intended to "force the truth out of characters and settings." Green Butchers is not a Dogme film, but some of its characteristics owe themselves to an artistic manifesto which instructed its adherents to make films by all means available, even "at the cost of good taste" if necessary.

    It's Jensen's second feature film after the well-received Flickering Lights (aka: Blinkende Lygter, 2000 - a film which also starred Mikkelsen and Kaas), another comedy-drama. Jensen's sly, dry humour is much in evidence here, too, as we follow the business of his two misfit butchers, 'Sweaty' Svend and pot smoking Bjarne, into the path of making meals out of unwanted humans. As critics have observed, this is a film with two intertwined threads, with much overt, and grisly, dark comedy revolving around Sven, a man who "has never been loved." He's apparently unable to show anyone the inside of his freezer without adding them to the chilled cabinet for the customers next morning, prepared as his speciality dish 'Chicky Wicky'. Bjarne's story brings to the narrative more in the way of pathos and sweetness as, while struggling with the predations of his increasingly erratic partner in butchery, he also has to come to terms with the sudden revival of his brain damaged twin brother, as well as burgeoning relationship with the slightly naïve Astrid.

    Playing both Bjarne and twin Eigil, Nikolaj Lie Kaas is remarkable in giving entirely separate performances throughout, so much so that I was going to make him a name to watch, but a quick look at his filmography reveals that he has already made 28 (including one related to his portrayal here, the notorious Dogme film Idiots of 1998) of which no fewer than 20 will have appeared in the last five years! The Walkenesque Mikkelsen, who is perhaps most familiar to British and American viewers as Tristan in the recent version of King Arthur, is also memorable, offering up Svend's characteristic, sweaty, culpability whilst sporting an unnaturally high, damp forehead (an on-screen effect gained, we learn, by a watering unit ingeniously devised by the special effects department).

    In the interviews which accompany the film on disc, Jensen mentions how keen he was to "make something better than farce" out of his subject matter and, if it has a fault, it is that his film occasional teeters too far in the opposite direction, refusing some obvious opportunities to show the comedy of panic or grim humour. Instead, Dogme's metier means that Green Butchers unfolds slowly, with more natural pauses and silences, and an unforced lunacy all of its own. Such deadpan absurdity frequently pays dividends (one especially relishes Svend's quiet words to the newly returned Eigel, soft toy under his arm, that he should "point the giraffe somewhere else, so that we can talk calmly again") although there have been complaints from some that a sharper edge to the bloody proceedings, other than those demonstrated by Bjarne and Svend's knives, would have been welcome. To be sure, some cannibalistic movies, such as Romero's Dawn Of The Dead bring an apt comment on consumerism. Instead Jensen's film relates slaughter back to interior matters such as Svend's compulsive, murderous need to be loved and successful - a result he eventually achieves through his marinade - or even by placing the act of butchery in a entirely different context outside of society altogether. For instance the comment by Holger, famous for his deer sausages, that "It's mythological to kill an animal and then mock it by sticking it in its own intestine." Outraged by the role that nature played in provoking the death of his parents, Bjarne sees his work as specifically an act of revenge on animals, not people, a logic that places him apart from such characters as Sweeney Todd. While the eager consumers of Chicky Wickys queue up outside the shop eager for their next portion, obvious satire is played down. In interview, the cast and writer see the film's focus elsewhere, on "coming to terms with one's fate," or learning to live at peace with oneself.

    Of course interior states are always subjective rather than objective. And if the Dogme creed values strict naturalism, then Green Butchers is a film which, although related to the movement by eschewing overt dramatics, it never the less inhabits a separate, almost fantasy world of its own - another point acknowledged on the DVD's accompanying interviews. It's a place not unaopposed to the fertile and dark imaginations of Caro and Jeunet (to whose successful Delicatessen it has sometimes been compared) if without their Gallic flamboyance, and whose odd elements gradually fit into a weird whole. Indeed the last scene of the film makes the point succinctly, drawing together the principal characters in a moment that is both playful, absurd and unifying at the same time. Given the unique nature of Green Butchers (how often does one see a Danish cannibalism movie?) as well as uniformly excellent performances, it can be recommended.
    helpful•31
    2
    • FilmFlaneur
    • Feb 3, 2006

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • March 21, 2003 (Denmark)
    • Country of origin
      • Denmark
    • Language
      • Danish
    • Also known as
      • Зелені різники
    • Filming locations
      • Det Danske Filmstudie, Lyngby, Sjælland, Denmark(Studio)
    • Production companies
      • M&M Productions
      • TV2 Danmark
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Gross US & Canada
      • $3,783
    • Opening weekend US & Canada
      • $2,483
      • Dec 12, 2004
    • Gross worldwide
      • $3,783
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      1 hour 40 minutes
    • Color
      • Color
    • Aspect ratio
      • 2.35 : 1

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