Kongen av Bastøy

It's such a shame the Norwegian Committee did not choose this film as the contender for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

The acting is top notch from all the main characters. Kristoffer Joner and Stellan Skarsgård's characters really gives you the chill, but the actors that really surprised was the newcomers Trond Nilssen and Benjamin Helstad characters. They delivered the best dialogs and very convincing acting.

If you are a sucker for true stories about injustice, mental and physical abuse and uprising against a brutal regime, then go watch this film now! Forget about The Troll Hunter, this is probably one of the best Norwegian films from the last decades.

A gripping and tragic movie made even more so because its based on real events. It surrounds the infamous Bastøy Boys Home correctional facility in Norway and the violent uprising that took place there in 1915, led in part by 17 year old inmate Erling who bucks against the brutal regime.

I spent the entire movie feeling cold, exhausted and hungry as the wintry isolation almost becomes a character in itself here. Why didn't anyone ever wear a jacket? Was that part of the punishment at the home?

Great performances from everyone, although for some reason I'd been expecting more brutality from Stellan Skarsgard, maybe because he always looks so angry and mean. The real problem here was the dorm master!

In the end I was left wondering how much of this story is true and slightly confused by the bittersweet flash-forward at the end, how many years later was that? Was "he" a whaling captain? A little vague. 02.15.14

Another piece of Norwegian greatness. KING OF DEVIL'S ISLAND (great title, incidentally) is one of those based-on-a-true-story-you've-never-heard-of movies, charting the brutality of life inside a remote and wintry island-based borstal during the early 20th century.

Coming across as a Norwegian version of the hard-hitting British SCUM, KING OF DEVIL'S ISLAND is great whichever way you look at it. The technical qualities are excellent, as is the acting from a mostly no-name cast whose one main star is Stellan Skarsgard, as miserable and burly as he's ever been. It's the developing relationship between Benjamin Helstad and Trond Nilssen that really makes this involving viewing, despite the distasteful elements of the subject matter and the general feeling that this isn't going to have a happy ending.

In any case, I absolutely loved this film and want to see more like it. The Scandinavian countries seem to be turning out hit after hit at the moment, both in television and film, and it's a shame Britain and the USA couldn't follow some of their cues. If you want a lesson in how to make an exceptional bit of drama then you could do a lot worse than checking out KING OF DEVIL'S ISLAND.

King of Devil's Island (2010)

A very straight forward, hard hitting, well acted account based on a true story of a boy's penal colony on a Norwegian Island early in the 20th Century.

That says it all. It is what it is, and there is the almost inevitable rebel and leader among the boys against the sometimes evil, sometimes indifferent adults who rule the group with false benevolence. You know who is right and who is wrong, and you follow the plot with a mixture of expectation and outrage. It's dramatic great stuff. Yes, been there and seen that somehow before, but it's severe and beautiful in its setting and intense and provocative within.

It might be interesting to compare this to more famous prison movies (the dubious "Shawshank" and earlier classics like "Birdman from Alcatraz") to realize how much this one is holding to a line of truth. As much as the events are extreme (eventually), the filmmaking is filled with restraint. Compare further to a movie like "Shutter Island" and you know that this one is practically a grey, subdued documentary.

And this is to its advantage. It's not a mind-blowing experience in cinema terms--it's just a really well done, focused, sensitive telling of a forgotten story of repression and survival and maybe, in the end, the every lifting human spirit.

KING OF DEVIL'S ISLAND (Kongen av Bastøy) is an experience more than a film. It dares to take the viewer where all is black and white, emotionally and visually, and while the film is shot in color, the only moment of color in this dark, atmospherically eerie snow bound island boys prison is the occasional blood and fire that creates even more of an impact because of the bleak screen that serves as background for the story. Based on a true story by Mette M. Bølstad and Lars Saabye Christensen and adapted for the screen by Dennis Magnusson and Eric Schmid, the fine cast is directed by Marius Holst.

In 1915 on the island Bastøy, located in the Oslo fjord, live a group of delinquent, young boys aged 11 to 18 in the Bastøy Boys Reform School. The boys daily, sadistic regime is run by the guards and Governor Bestyreren (Stellan Skarsgård) who is stern but seemingly fair in his management of the reform school (his wife lives with him in an opulent manner). But the Housemaster, a smarmy pedophile names Master Bråthen (Kristoffer Joner), is cruel and malicious and bestows both mental and physical abuse on the boys: the boys are used for cheap manual labor rather than being schooled and 'corrected' to return to society. The boys attempt to survive by adapting to their inhumane conditions. One day a new 17 year old boy, Erling who is assigned the 'name' C19 (Benjamin Helstad), arrives with his own agenda: how to escape from the island. How far is he willing to go in order to get his freedom? There is a stalwart lad Ivar/C5 (Magnus Langlete) who is due for release and a rather frail lad Olav/C1 (Trond Nilssen) who falls victim to the Master: these lads are C19's colleagues. After a tragic incident takes place, Erling ends up forced into the destinies of the other boys by leading them into a violent uprising. Once the boys manage to take over Bastøy 150 government soldiers are sent in to restore order. How he maneuvers the escape fantasy brings a surprising ending to the story.

The acting is first rate from a fine group of young actors. The cinematography is by John Andreas Andersen and the haunting musical score is by Johan Söderqvist. In Norwegian with English subtitles. A moody, deeply moving work. Grady Harp, February 12