Ett hål i mitt hjärta

Mr. Moodysson made a flick here that has very little rhyme, but a lot of reason. No, wait...it has a lot of rhyme, but zero reason. No! It's...uh, there's a little bit from...hmmm.

As soon as A Hole in My Heart began, I realized taking that little bit of Nyquil probably wasn't the greatest of ideas. But luckily, I'm a tough guy, and I managed to keep focus on Lukas's lil experiment. Because that's what this was kinda, an outlined experiment. Well, I think so anyways.

For me, I split the movie into separate aspects. One ideal is for the three adults (the Dad, his friend and the porn actress) of the movie, and the other is for the son. With the three adults your shown immaturity, delusion, confusion, and just a whole wave of emotional problems. Not far away is the son; overly thoughtful, a shut-in, quiet...and simply appears the polar opposite to the three on the other side of the door. And whatever story this movie was trying to present, in my opinion, lies within comparing the two sides to another other, and hoping they would find a common ground. And even that was hard to do, as all the characters (even the son) were rather unlikable, and all relied on pity.

Was the film intriguing? Yeah, I guess. Was it well directed? I thought so. Was it entertaining? Not really. Is there a deeper meaning than simply comparing the people to one another, and not trying to look at them as useless human beings? Maybe. But if you really want to do such a thing, I think you're already fighting an uphill battle.

From my point of view there's not much to learn from this film, as it was mostly full of negative things. And I'm curious to know Lukas's point of the film. I would guess it was a very simple idea. I could easily say this film's underlying message is to get an education. But I could be dead wrong. Watch this flick if you like to ponder about movies afterwards. Don't if you don't.

I chose Moodysson's film out of another 200 at the Jerusalem Film Festival because of the good impression of Fu__ing Åmål. Apparently, he has gone to a totally different place meanwhile...

Even before genres and modes, I believe there are two basic elements for any film whatsoever: there has to be a reason, a motivation for what you see, and there needs to be some effective cinematic language in use. Some good films do well with just one, sometimes one feeds the other. My problem with Ett Hål i mitt hjärta, and eventually what made me give up watching halfway through, was that I found none.

A blatant, border-breaking experiment? nice, but after 15 minutes it got boring. A manifest against the porno industry? OK, but the shattered style blocked any attempt of mine to get closer to the characters. If anything, it reinstated how essential it is to identify with your protagonists on the screen in order to feel empathy.

I don't mind seeing labia all over the screen - there just has to be a REASON. It's the fine border between noise and music, scribbles and art.

Just when you think that the film has done everything it can to shock and disgust you ... it gets worse ! Thinking about scenes in isolation, they shouldn't be too bad - but I guess it's the whole development of the characters that make events so disturbing.

The director was on stage afterwards (London Film Festival) and said that he thought there were something like 68 different messages in the film, but wouldn't expand on any of them, and wouldn't answer questions about why he had blanked out all the logos - other than to confirm that he had done it on purpose. He also claimed that he didn't understand the film himself, and that he would much prefer to be making children's movies rather than this type of film.

Before the film he had predicted that 9% of the audience would walk out during the film - he seemed pleased that the dropout rate was lower than expected !

Worth seeing, if you like being made to feel uncomfortable ...

You'll probably hear a lot about how shocking and unrelenting this film is. My first reaction was to call the film "Pink Flamingoes"-esque, but I knew this was wrong, as this movie never shocks for the sake of shock itself. I've never seen another Moodysson film (although I will now), but his fury really came through and spoke to me here. He is taking our civilization's obsessions with seeing everything, with pushing limits, and shoving it in our face, making us hurt for it. That said, there is much beauty here as well, and a pitch black humour that carries viewers through the darkest moments. The protagonist, a teenage boy who spends most of his time in his room with headphones on, attempting to block out the increasingly depraved porno being filmed by his father and friends in the living room of a tiny apartment, tells a couple of stories based around the theme of beauty existing under the most impossible conditions, life flourishing where no one would've thought it could, and he is referring both to himself and the moments of grace that Moodysson places throughout the film. He even manages to give a feeling of hope by the end, which stuck with me as I walked down the street, although my stomach gave a serious churn as I walked by an adult video store.

Having loved 'Together' and admired, for the most part, 'Lilya 4-Ever' (as well as his short films), I was dreadfully disappointed with this new work from Moodyson. In an interview about 'A Hole On My Heart' Moodyson stated that he thought it was his best and most complex film, before saying that he didn't know what the film was supposed to be about, not offering any explanation other than 'it has many layers'. Such statements reveal entirely the reason behind the film's failure. Depsite Moodyson's assertion of complexity, there is simply nothing in this 90+ minute film that could not have been adequately communicated in a short. Simply juxtaposing unpleasant images of cosmetic surgery and action men figures with home-made pornography does not constitute a complex statement on anything. In fact the film is hopelessly meandering and one has the increasing feeling that it was 'discovered' in the editing room. I'm very interested in non-narrative film-making, and I don't need a 'story' to communicate events to me, but it is evident to me when there is a severe paucity of drive and ideas, and that feeling was evident throughout a viewing of this film. It concerns me that this film will be defended by people who feel that sitting through the unpleasant content constitutes some sort of test of intellectual rigour and that those who didn't like it are not prepared to 'face up' to the reality this film purports to present. In fact the simple truth is that this is an empty film, with a painful lack of understanding of how to dramatise ideas. I really hope Moodyson comes up with something better next time - I think his talents outstrip nonsense like this.