Oh Happy Day

There is power in music ... there is power in singing. Hopefully you can use it in a good or positive way. We get our main character here, who seems to get enlightened in a way. And finding new love for ... things she didn't think she had in her.

Oh Happy Day is a gospel tune I reckon most will know or have heard at least once. Is it a happy day though? Maybe the very last frame is an answer to that ... quite revealing some may say. Until then this is a nicely drawn out drama about people finding themselves and their "voice" - no pun intended.

Movies should make you feel something...this film delivers. Gospel music can be life changing...and in Hannah's case, it was. I fell in love with the characters as they fell in love with each other. At times, a bit unrealistic, but, hey, it's a film of fiction. On the other hand, that gospel music gets me every time.

Has Danish comedy started to repeat itself? And not only itself, also others? It's a little too much running in forms we've seen before. Ordinary people, having ordinary conflicts. They are altogether good, but here they are (of course) hit by "life". They learn something, change their lives and when the film ends, they are much wiser, but still ordinary.

Here you find the woman, who hasn't fulfilled her dreams, living in a dead marriage. Then the black Harlem gospel reverend appears and she starts to believe, in her herself, in music, in life and even in God. It's too simple after all. There's hardly more than 1,5 dimension here. Thats's not enough to be called a gospel.

This movie is being sold as a comedy and that was what I expected to see. To my (very positive) astonishment it proved to have a much wider range of appeal. There were very amusing episodes and dialog, but mainly to me it appeared to be a movie about growing up (even if late in life). Hannah's emotionally been on the run since in her youth she backed out on a chance to fulfill a dream of singing publicly. She's pretending to herself that she is content with her married family life, but when she accidentally meets the leader of an American baptist choir and he volunteers to direct her little, amateurish parish choir dams starts breaking in her mind. She (and the audience) is confronted with existential questions of self confidence and faith. This is all dealt with in a way that You start forgetting this is just a movie and not real life. It ends on a feel-good level, but not all conflicts are solved. And when: not always like one would suspect.

This movie marries two highly unlikely subjects: Danish small-town life and gospel music.

Moses Jackson, leader of an American gospel choir, is stranded in a (very) provincial danish village after his bus crashes - because of Hannah, neglected wife and singer in a rather amateurish danish choir. Jackson decides to work with the choir and takes them on a musical and spiritual journey that enriches everybody's life.

A very high feel-good factor, some wonderful dialogue, and the undeniable screen-appeal of gospel music combine to make this a very enjoyable movie.