This little film is about the young farmer, who lives alone on his farm and seldom sees anyone, except the couple that on the other side of lake, if we don't count the ghost of his mother, who has been dead a while.She gives him advice in time of crisis, trying to make his life more bearable.
A chance meeting when visiting his parents' grave, he exchange a quick smile with a similarly lonely person, a young woman who is there visting her husband's grave. This woman is totally unlike him, very urban, very modern, having an intellectual job (librarian), with nil knowledge of the harsh life on a small farm, but their relation, when it at last developes into something - after many misses and misunder- standings - is very explosive, and at times troublesome, as their two totally different ways of life clash and interaction with their respective friends (simple farmers versus intellectuals of various sorts) is not that easy. Neither are their totally different goals in life very compatible - he wants a family and she says she will not commit herself at all!
Elisabet Carlsson, who plays the mondaine librarian, does so with such gusto and feeling, so much humour and cold logic that she mostly reminds me of Julia Roberts in Erin Brockovich.
The farmer is well played by Michael Nyqvist, who I personally only remember from minor roles before this.I doff my hat - as good acting as Niclas Cage in his better moments.
It also, I think,shows that the two are long time friends, as the entire film is superb! Maybe the ending could have been different (it is different from the book it is based on, anyway), but a car chase, where a guy is racing to stop his great love disappear from his life, is always OK!
I have never lauded a Swedish film before, but I do it this time: Go and see it, or buy it on DVD - it has English subtitles already! A must to see, if there ever was one!
