The Bothersome Man

Den brysomme mannen

Norway, Iceland

2006

95 Min

Color

1.85:1

Norwegian

Currently 3.9/5 Stars.
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CAST Trond Fausa Aurvåg, Petronella Barker, Per Schaaning, Birgitte Larsen, Johannes Joner, Ellen Horn

Cannes (Semaine de la critique): ACID Award, São Paulo (Mostra Noruega), Toronto (Contemporary World Cinema), Göteborg: FIPRESCI Prize, London (Cinema Europa), AFI FEST (World Cinema), San Sebastián (Cold Fever)

Synopsis

A 40-year-old man arrives in a mysteriously idyllic city with no memory of having traveled there, only to realize that there is something decidedly sinister about his emotionally sterile new home in director Jens Lien’s surreal, genre-jumping mystery.

Shortly after arriving in the curiously colorless city, Andreas (Trond Fausa Aurvag) is presented with a new apartment and told to report to the office where his amiable new boss, Håvard (Johannes Joner), will provide him with all the details of his new accounting job. Friendship seems to come fast and flavorless in this new town, and no one ever seems to get too upset or too happy. It isn’t long before Andreas marries an attractive interior designer named Anne-Britt (Petronella Barker), and as the pair settle into a comfortable routine of emotionally vacant dinner parties, never-ending home improvement, and mechanical sex, the newly arrived citizen gradually begins to question why everyone seems so superficial, the food has no taste, and excessive alcohol intake fails to induce inebriation. As the ubiquitous “Caretakers” who preside over the city take note that their latest arrival just doesn’t seem to fit in, Andreas attempts a daring but failed escape. When Andreas meets the like-minded Hugo, who reveals that beautiful music streams out of a crack in the wall of his cellar, the pair quickly concoct a foolproof escape plan that is sure to succeed.

Director

Jens Lien

Jens Lien (born 14 September 1967) is a Norwegian film director. He graduated from the London International Film School in 1993. His graduation project was the short film “Montana”, that was featured at the short film festival in Grimstad that year. in 1995 he again participated in this festival, with the entry “Mitt elektriske kjøkken” (My Electrical Kitchen). Lien went on to make the short films “Døren som ikke smakk” (Shut the Door, 2000) og “Naturlige Briller” (Natural Glasses, 2001). Both of these films were based on scripts by Per Schreiner, and both were featured at the Cannes International Film Festival. In addition to this Lien has also made a number of advertisements.

In 2003 he had his feature film debut with the movie Jonny Vang. The movie was selected for the Berlin Film festival. The movie was awarded an Amanda Award for “Best Actor” (Aksel Hennie) in 2003. It was also nominated in the category “Best Film”, but lost out to Bent Hamer’s Salmer fra kjøkkenet.Lien’s… read more