Raus aus Åmål

This was one of the best lesbian movies i ever seen. I can personally relate to the characters, and i believe that they portrayed young teen lesbians very realisticly, that is how we really are folks, none of that hollywood blonde bimbo stuff, that was real. There was nothing fake about this movie and i think the actresses were awesome! If you're looking for a real quality movie, i suggest you give this movie a chance!!

Director Lukas Moodysson's Show Me Love is an eerily accurate commentary on 1990s teenagers in small-towns in Sweden. In fact, it's accurate almost to the point of being mistaken for Reality. It is above all other things a love story, exploring the relationship of two closet-lesbians girls at a modern High School. Many people thought Show Me Love was worth checking out for its bizarre premise alone, but only a few minutes into the movie you can tell that it is one of the most grounded, realistic portrayals in European cinema.

The dialog, for one, is fantastically realistic and blunt and this makes Show Me Love a very subtle film; it shows things exactly the way they are, down to the very recognizable expressions that the teenagers use and the awkwardness of interacting at that age. It criticizes stereotypes and socioeconomic classes and makes a point without preaching and this is something that is extremely rare in Hollywood cinema and that you can perhaps appreciate more in international films.

The film is not devoid of High School stereotypes, but they are much more subtle than you'd find in the average, American mainstream high school flick. There is no distinct jock, no perfect prom-queen and no nerd. Instead you have the seemingly popular girl, Elin (Alexandra Dahlström), who in fact struggle with many things, including her sexuality and somewhat Emo (although the term "Emo" wasn't coined yet) girl, Agnes, who is anything but popular and has mountains of worries. These two teenagers find a connection and an attraction that is entirely inappropriate. They fall in love.

Elin and Agnes are extremely likable characters; Elin despite her constant need for attention and her popular status, and Agnes despite her sometimes whiny depression. What they have in common is that they're both fundamentally lonely young girls who are fed up with their places in life, and in Åmål—("Why do we have to live here?") probably the most boring city in Scandinavia.

Show Me Love is one of my favorite movies for its simplicity. No fancy editing, no effects, no flashy lightning or anything even remotely out-of-place. In this sense, it follows many rules of Dogme 95 film-making. It just stays true to the gloomy, boring, small town that is Åmål. But don't let this scare you off, because this is not a depressing movie – it is a delightful and warming film with heart.

Usually when I flip through the channels and come across a foreign film, it's either an unrealistic sexual crazy flick or a Gerard Depardieu period piece with WAY too much dialogue....this sure was a pleasant surprise.

I'll admit-I'm skeptical when it comes to any movie anymore, much more so when it deals with teens, as so many films on adolescence are completely unrealistic. I started watching this expecting a false move any second now. .....A-any minute.....

But no. In fact, the beautiful acting was the first thing that took me by surprise. Everyone did a tremendous job..especially the character of Agnes...but everyone did great.

The second thing I noticed was the direction, which moved perfectly at all the right times. As someone mentioned, "directed with love", this certainly was...the characters set the pace and the tone...the camerawork let them do that.

The final thing.....the language. How glad I was that I got to hear those heartfelt Swedish sounds, spoken so earnestly, yet so carefully, like Nutella on toast! (Is that Swedish OK, well you get the idea, no? =)

I'd recommend this film to anyone...but even if you're like me, with a bit of ADD who likes to hide from anything "artsy", you will be pleasantly surprised!

For me, when watching this movie, one has to keep in mind any other teen-love movies you might have seen. Heck, ALL teen movies are fair game. Then, when watching this movie, notice how those other movies begin to crumble under their own stupidity, and jump off large cliffs like celluloid lemmings. Now THAT'S great filmmaking. Great films go straight for the jugular of other films; thinning out the herd.

Fucking Åmål takes adolescence, and instead of portraying how wonderfully blissful it all was, it shows how it was a time in everyone's life for over-dramatizing and acting mostly petty. But then, out of these ashes rises something that was great about those awkward years: love. Because you didn't stop being dramatic when it came to love, but you celebrated it. Like the characters in this movie, everyone who fell in love in high school spent time brooding over class pictures, or waited by the phone for that one call. Moodysson uses the scenes at the school and the parties to allow viewers to reflect on how awkward and cruel being in high school was. But instead of carrying this effect into the lovely land of high school crushes, he instead raises them up on a pedastal. It made me wonder if i can't love like that again: with no hesitation, no complications, and with all my heart.

What makes this film great though (and not just good) is by bringing the issue of homosexuality into it, but he slowly begins to make the issue hazy and unclear so that it no longer becomes an issue except for the less developed, and unliked, characters in the film. By the end of the movie, it doesn't matter that Agnes and Elin are to GIRLS in love, but that they are two girls in LOVE. In an age where media has transformed homosexuality into more about sexuality and less about love, Moodysson flips the scales. By the end of the movie, you start to realize that Agnes isn't a lesbian, because that title is worthless. She's just a person who loves. She celebrates what she finds beautiful (Elin). Of course, Elin is the main character of the film because she is the one who changes and matures. She elevates herself out of the social stratosphere of high school lunches, and into a world without personal boundries.

Last, one has to admire the fact that Moodysson doesn't take the film over the edge, and make it too much about how girls need to look for love just amongst themselves because all teenage boys are immature. First, he portrays most all of the other kids (regardless of sex) as immature except for Agnes and Elin, not just boys in particular. Then, he allows the viewer to sympathize with Johan. Johan maybe confused and unsure of himself, but he was just as much in love with Elin as Agnes was. How easy it might have been to make him mean, stupid, and worthless, so that viewers would be happy to see Elin flee him and go to Agnes. But he's not, he's kind-hearted and genuinely seems to care about Elin. Once again, this is Moodysson using love to blind the issue of heterosexualty and homosexuality and concentrate on love itself.

Definitely a movie for the romantic, and one that will teach you how to correctly fall in love again.

I'm usually impervious to teen movies. I just can't get beyond the usual moaning, complaining and whining. I find it too much to bear, especially from people who don't have to work for a living, who still have their parents looking after them and who are incapable of expressing themselves properly. I, for one, a pauper scumbag languishing in the job market, would love to have their inconsequential problems. But if I take myself back to my school days then I can just about find humanity enough to sympathise. My teenage years weren't tough – I actually really rather enjoyed school – but I know how it feels to grow up not knowing what you want from life and where you're going. It's certainly a confusing time.

So it's perhaps because of that that I enjoy Show Me Love. It's depiction of teenage years feels genuine and honest and I can relate to most of it. As opposed to Hollywood teen films where all the girls are strikingly gorgeous, the boys are ripped and everyone goes around driving cars and doing designer drugs. My school days weren't like that at all. They were much more like Moodysson's film where the girls wear bad make-up, the boys are hopeless with the opposite sex and where a crushing air of mediocrity hangs in the atmosphere. Everything seems hopeless.

But despite that, my adolescence was pretty smooth sailing. There were no great trails or tribulations. Which is perhaps why I find it so hard to relate to teenagers. Not once did I want to kill myself and I never spent any time pining for a girl (lusting, yeah, but love never entered my mind). So to me their problems always seem rather…pathetic. But because Show Me Love depicts adolescence so genuinely, with all its awkwardness and idiocy, I can't help but like it.

What rings most true is the sheer incompetence of boys around girls. At that age, most of the males of the species are hopeless with the opposite sex. They haven't a clue. And so the terrible compliments ('Jesus you're beautiful') and bone-headed chat-up attempts are rather amusing. Johan, in particular, with his awful bike and terrible baseball cap is subject of the most laughs. He's Amal in physical form. A dead end. And Markus, the other boy, is no better. He knows nothing about women either. In fact, the boys are more comfortable with each other. They'd rather spend time measuring mobile phones. Only with mobile phones, small is best. Inverse penis measuring, anyone?

And the sheer awfulness of a lot of the girls also rings a bell. I don't know her name, but the girl with the miniscule eyebrows (which makes her look rather sinister and perpetually shocked) reminds me of a lot of horrible girls at school. Girls who were experts in making other people's lives a misery. And then there's the handicapped girl. Agnes is unfortunate enough to be friends with her, even though she doesn't like her. Those friendships are the worst – friendships born entirely of convenience and without a shred of genuine affection. Nothing is more suffocating. But as in real life, such friendships are hard to get out of. You may not particularly like the person, you may have nothing in common and you may have nothing to say to one another, but at school to be alone is to be exposed. It's better to have someone in your corner – anyone. And it's especially hard to get out of the friendship if someone has a disability. You feel obliged to make them certain concessions. So therefore it's quite shocking, yet understandable, that Agnes lashes out at the girl and that the girl takes it the way she does. However, the disabled girl's attempts to get back at Agnes and curry favour with the rest of her classmates make me squirm. I saw many such incidents myself at school.

Less convincing, however, and it's a major reservation, is the sincerity of Elin's feelings towards Agnes. I just can't help but feel that it's a passing thing. Sure she may be a lesbian or bisexual, but I can't quite decide whether she does actually love Agnes – I completely believe in Agnes' feelings. She just seems to flit too often from one person or to one thing. There's one bit where's she checking to see what's cool and what's not cool. Is this her way of getting back? Is this her way of giving her life excitement? I'm not sure. When I first saw it I was more dubious, but now that I've watched it a couple more times I'm more willing to give the film the benefit of the doubt. I mean, Elin does reach the film's conclusion and her own conclusion rather haphazardly, but in that moment she does seem completely honest. And the ending, when they literally come out of the closet, is a great moment (although perhaps a little glib. I can't bear to think what they'd have to put up with afterwards and whether their fledgling relationship would survive).

But still, even if I'm not 100% sure of Elin's feelings, it still manages to be a rather beguiling film. And this is mostly down to Rebecca Liljeberg's performance as Agnes. As I've already said, most teens I don't really care about, but Agnes is an exception. She's a smart girl with good parents but who still feels miserable. But despite this, her character is never annoying and never seems selfish. She just wants what everyone wants. She wants to be happy and she wants to feel normal. And because she goes through such an understandable range of emotions during the course of the film, and because her angst seems so genuine and deeply felt, I can't help but love the end of the film.