Efterskalv

Bleak, sombre social drama from Sweden about a teenager who moves back in with his father and younger brother after having served a prison sentence for a serious crime. It's a harrowing insight that writer/director Magnus von Horn and lead actor Ulrik Munther gives us when we realize the depth of John's problems with adjusting to a life of normal behaviour. Solid acting and distinctive camera-work helps intensify the experience. With Ulrik Munther, Mats Blomgren, Wieslaw Komasa, Alexander Nordgren, Loa Ek, Ellen Jelinek and Inger Nilsson.

The review is finished now. This is just to fill out the character limit.

Auteur Magnus von Horn has created something that is quite deeply troubling to watch here as we follow the struggles of the young "John" (Ulrik Munther) as he returns home after a period of incarceration. Whilst we are uncertain as to quite what he did, we do know that he was locked up for two years and that his return home and to school is being treated with pretty universal disdain by his small, tightly-knit, community. What now ensues is a delicately presented evaluation of mob rule. Initially using more psychological tools like shunning before that particular pot over-boils and heads inevitably towards more extreme and dangerous behaviour. Munther delivers a really quite poignant performance here as does Mats Blomgren as his distraught and increasingly conflicted father "Martin" and the assembled supporting cast who offer up an effective degree of animus and toxicity that resonates more as the story asks questions that we know cannot be answered straightforwardly by anyone. I did wonder, on the plausibility front, if the absence of the police or other authorities to keep an eye on this young man either for the protection of himself or his community didn't quite ring true, but perhaps their omission from the thrust of the story managed to further illustrate just how brutal even the most ostensibly civilised can be when their wagons get circled. Not an easy watch, nor a conclusive one, but worth an hour and an half.

Sadly, this debut is very mediocre and Magnus' skills to handle work on a film set are even poorer. The film is a wasted potential of a good idea. Magnus Von Horn has little to offer as a filmmaker.

The moral dilemma this film is about, is excellently summed up by a small piece of conversation, in one of the first scenes. Teenager John enters a classroom, and several students start protesting and walking out. Teacher: 'Everybody has a right to a second chance'. Student: 'Everybody has a right to live'. For the attentive viewer, at that moment it becomes clear that John might have committed a murder. Later on, several scenes help understanding what exactly happened. The film essentially is about forgiving, or more precise about the willingness to forgive. The interesting thing is that the viewer at first is inclined to sympathize with John, who seems to be the victim of ruthless rejection by the community. But later on, it becomes clear that in reality John is a hopeless case, a socially inept person who makes things impossible for everyone around him. Above all for his father, who also has to cope with John's younger brother and his stubborn grandfather.

Apart from posing a moral dilemma, the film also has an interesting father-son dimension. It shows how difficult it can be for a parent to love a child that has severe psychological problems. At times, the film reminded me of Xavier Dolan's 'Mommy' and Lynne Ramsay's 'We Need To Talk About Kevin'. Both films explore the same theme, and 'The Here After' can easily stand next to them.

One very important element in the film is the camera work. It is done by Lukasz Zal, who also contributed to the stunning cinematography of the Polish film 'Ida'. The movie is mostly filmed by fixed cameras, and the image doesn't move even if the action sometimes shifts out of the camera frame. This gives the film something special, as if the awkward way the characters interact, is echoed by the immovable images.

By the way: I didn't quite understand the title 'The Here After', which I associate with life after death. Apparently, the original Swedish title 'Efterskalv' means 'Aftershock', for example in the context of an earthquake. It makes me wonder why the English title is so much different.

This is a film, which struggles to make clear what it wants to be. It is also riddled with inconstancy's which leaves the viewer wondering just what they are being offered. The first part, the arrival, John arrives home from an unspecified period of time, in an unspecified institution, his monosyllabic part of the overall script, quickly lead this watcher to wonder if they might be better off leaving the viewing and reading a newspaper? Moving onto the next part, which fails significantly to clarify the muddy mist, which has descended over the screening. Whilst the action improves significantly, with the arrival of some form of normality, the lack of any relationship between father and son is slightly clarified by the arrival of granddad, but remains boring. The final segment of the film is no clearer than the rest, but at least by then we do have a fuller idea as to just what is going on, but only just. I understand that the film maker, was making an analogy of Swedish Society and the problems that unchecked immigration is bringing Sweden and there way of life. But there are far better ways of getting your message across, that migration is a massive problem and is causing no end of problems between Swedes and uncle tom cobly and all.