A corazón abierto

Halfway through Open Hearts, it becomes more obvious that you're watching a fictional account. The plot becomes slightly predictable, which is a good thing. For the most part, this new Danish film feels like a reality documentary and pulls you in like reality itself. Director Susanne Bier follows the technical requirements to earn a Dogme 95 certification, which means the film has to be devoid of any unnatural camera movement, lighting and sound among other rules. As a result, Open Hearts is also devoid of superficial movie cliches and full of heartfelt human situations.

The film follows a young, newly?engaged couple and a married couple with kids, whose lives are interrupted and complicated by a road accident. Bier stays clear of the external effects of the drama and instead focuses on the characters' inner effects. Her protagonists lose emotional control and appear ill?equipped to handle the consequences of an unexpected tragedy. The film's appeal is not only universal, but timely as well, shattering the modern belief that everything is controllable. Once tragedy strikes, our lives seem far more fragile than we thought.

Stephan Paschalides

Dogme movement (1995-2005) is a terra incognita for me, although now it has officially existed only as a terminology thanks to the ubiquitous evasion of shooting on location with any cellphones or other hand-held lighter gizmos, and its spirit has been ingested by more advanced mutants (e.g. mumblecore). But Susanne Bier is not merely a Dogme enthusiast, AFTER THE WEDDING (2006 7/10) is a redoubtable relationship dissection and OPEN HEARTS (the new Hannibal Mads Mikkelsen star in both films) treads the same territory to examine the complexity of humans' conundrum between desire and responsibility, ethics and emotions.

Two couples, one is engaged, another has 3 children, a car accident (not entirely abides by the Dogme rules though) turns their worlds upside down, a threat is common-or-garden both in the cinematic and real world; the life-changing mishap prompts an adultery between a middle class doctor and the disheartened fiancée, whose fiancé undergoes a permanent quadriplegia from the car accident where the doctor's wife is the offender.

The face-fixated close-ups extensively put those characters under scrutiny for their rational and irrational behaviors, natural light commingles with saturated palette (during the beginning and the ending) and a black & white lens of the blurry and grainy illusory fancy. The cast is sterling, a quartet of tug-of-war from Mikkelsen, Richter, Lie Kass and Steen, a humdrum-weary family man holds his seven-year-itch infatuation to a damsel-in-distress; a comfort-seeker with abiding guilt of abandoning her bed-ridden fiancé; a young paralyzer who ruthlessly deserts his fiancée for his incompetence as a proper man but still hankers for her company; a wife is rueful of her road rage and its tragic repercussions, suddenly devastated by her husband's utter betrayal; Steen's impromptu slapping and Mikkelsen's reaction are among the best on-screen intensified scenes I have even seen, three of the four leads end up in my yearly top 10 list (guess who narrowly missed the spot?).

But on the other hand, the melodramatic core of the story hobbles a soul-searching catharsis and empathetic introspection which would put the film onto an upper notch, Bier and DP Morten Søborg's camera is erratic but not dizzily shaky, the fly-on-the-wall intimacy allows us to take a much closer look at the symptoms and the cause of the frailty resides in every soul on earth, and offers us staying in a paralleled world, munches with palliative pills to ease our own troubles.

A Bergmanesque study of a marriage that is turned upsidedown by one part mishap and one part momentary lapse of reason. What's provocative here, and makes for an intelligent and moving film, is the way in which the spurned wife (played with quiet dignity by the estimable Paprika Steen) doesn't dish up deserved revenge, quivering hatred or physical or mental violence. but, rather, offers an attempt to understand, to accept, and to hold the family together regardless. How rare is this? The line that stays with me - and it's a casual aside but one that cuts straight to the bone - is Paprika telling her husband's mistress that `we can't even afford' the new furniture he has lavished on her.

Once the film hits its groove, its DOGME origins are forgotten and we're left with intimacy and the thousand and one little tragedies that unfold on any given day of any given week. It could be said to be modest in scope, somewhat uninventive in form, and it does immerse itself uncritically in the middle class milieu (and in this respect, I would liken it to Moretti's `La Stanza del Figlio' - except that film does seem to express a suppressed distaste for Berlusconi's Italy), but there's an honesty and maturity that make it a valuable experience - particularly for any teenager used to a soap opera diet of hysterical marriage operatics. or for anyone still recovering from `Festen'.

At its best, and there's a frisson of that here, DOGME-95 has delivered fresh slices of life (or, to elaborate, privileges a panorama of personal battles against a recognisably familiar backdrop) - its Vows of Chastity whittling the camera down to something akin to a microscope.

This movie has a sober sense of tragic : It shows how life is fragile and uncontrollable, whether it is a young couple passionately in love hit by a terrible accident or a double-kid mature couple whose husband will be unfaithful to his wife. The cleverness of the story-telling lies in the fact that the two stories are highly intertwined and all through movie you find yourself recognising everything the characters struggle through. You want to judge them but you are left with you own guilt without any conclusion fro the film. The documentary-style and the dogme do not prevail over the meaning and even give some realistic strength to the beautiful acting. To sum up : a simple tale of two destinies where tragedy reveal our fragility and love can redeem guilt. (7 out Of 10)

Another one of those small Euro digital films that explores human emotion so much better than the mega-bucks equivalents from the States.

When a loving couples unity is shattered by a horrific road accident that cripples the boyfriend, the story explores how a moment can destroy a lifetime or create alternate paths. Superbly acted with deep pathos and unflinching torment, I have yet to see a better performance this year of a female lead. You leave the cinema questioning how the happiest moment in your life can be stolen in a blink of an eye. Life is fragile and all too brief. Not a minute should be wasted.