Les feux de la vie

A beautiful bildungsroman-- a young man goes wandering through the world, making his way as he goes and meeting vivid people. The material isn't romantic-- poverty is general, and the young man discovers his own cruelty as well as the strengths that sustain him. This film had a huge cast, and Troell's use of widescreen fills the image with detail of 19th century provincial life that authenticates the performances-- I have remembered the dirty leer of its blacksmith for thirty years. I remember watching it, wishing there were an hour more of it.

The nearly three-hour film tracks the teenage years of Olof (Eddie Axberg) in the late 1910's. He leaves home at age 15 to find work, settling in at a lumber company, meeting odd characters and learning about life. Olof later moves on to working at a movie theater, and eventually a traveling circus. His experiences shape his outlook, as does his voracious reading, with a particular interest in philosophy.

Lyrical, meandering, often beautiful, this was director Troell's feature debut. It's a snapshot of Sweden at a particular time and among a particular class, but the film holds universal appeal thanks to the quality of its compositions and the effective performances. The secondary characters come and go, with Axberg's Olof being the one constant, and he anchors the film well. The cinematography is mostly B&W, but there are bits here and there in color, usually memories or imaginings of Olof's. Recommended.

Director Jan Troell filmed an autobiographical story by Eyvind Johnson about a boy coming of age in Sweden in the first decades of the twentieth century; the result is both empathetic and objective-we are touched by the kid's hardships and triumphs, but at the same time it shows the conditions of his life clearly and even dispassionately. The movie focuses on his working life, as he finds gigs as a logger, brickyard worker, film projectionist, and sawmill helper, most of them very dangerous; on the happier side, he meets girls and becomes an avid reader. This is a beautiful movie, but not for everyone-it moves slowly, it's in black and white, and some people might not be able to relate to the harsh life it portrays.

Jan Troell's debut film is a pleasure to view. It's realistic, yet artful, and shot in tasteful black and white. He takes great care with poetry of nature, along with picturesque composition.

Alas, when it comes to original narrative, Mr. Troell doesn't demonstrate that's his forte. The film for me felt largely redundant, as though almost half could be deleted for a stronger cumulative statement.

Later on in his career, "The Immigrants" and "The New Land" revealed the film maker's talent best realized. In contrast, "Here's Your Life" merely shows technical promise in its photographic imagery. What's needed is a skilled writer.

It's easy to understand the work being selected by Sweden as its entry in the Academy Award foreign language category--and the Academy's rejecting it's qualification.

Today it's a "forgotten film" shown occasionally on the TCM network.

This film is a piece of art. I watched this famous 3-hour long film and was chocked by it´s fantastical visual style. It begins in black and white and then suddenly you see the color bird (which shows up several times in the film)and then your in the film for the next almost three hours.

It´s about a boy in 1914 who leaves his home to start to work.The film is very critical to the society and it´s a big epic and on the same time it is a very beautiful film. The acting by Eddie Axberg is one of the best performances I have seen in a long time.The film tells the story very honestly and it´s(as I wrote before) visual style is inspiring.A masterpiece that deserves without a doubt a 5/5