Misery Harbour

Well, we had some help from the Scandanavians. Normally I avoid Canadian movies automatically. 90% of them are ghastly and pretentious. I made an exception here because we had visited Newfoundland last fall. I had been under the impression that it was a spoof of Random Passage. Not at all. It's a rollicking good adventure based on a true story. There is action, romance, rape and humour. Good stuff indeed!

"Misery Harbour" is the story of the young Dane Espen Arnakke's (Coster Waldau) life, which he tells us about through a book he is writing some years later, read by his friend Jenny (von der Lippe). About his rather miserable adolescence in the Danish town of Jante, his escape from there on board a ship on its way to Newfoundland, his life in Canada, and how one person can spoil so much for another, John Wakefield (Graham).

Directed by Nils Gaup ("Ofelas", Academy Award nominee for best foreign language film in 88), it is a visual delight, accompanied by some great music, which suits the atmosphere perfectly. The storyline is also fascinating, showing how Espen gets to learn that the norm from his hometown, basically saying that you aren't supposed to believe you are anything, exists in other places as well. The acting is solid throughout, especially by Stuart Graham, who manages to keep a certain nerve to the cruel character he plays until the very end.

Overall, I must say I was impressed (and it's not often I say that about a Norwegian production), and if you bump over it, you should see it.

I really enjoyed this film. If anyone has seen it and liked it, I recommend reading a book by the Danish born Norwegian author Axel Sandemosse, who this movie is based on (whoever "Espen Arnakke" is supposed to be, must be a pseudonym). Aksel Sandemosse wrote the famous "Janteloven," or the law of Jante, in which he criticized the stifling nature of Scandinavian culture. Basically, in Jante, Denmark, as I am told, everyone was a fisherman, and everyone who aspired to be something else, was discouraged from such thoughts (such as creative writers). The movie is great without knowing this history, but it is also interesting to read into it with this background.

This is a great movie, and ranks with Ofelas as Gaups finest hour. The adaptation of Axel Sandemose`s book En flyktning krysser sitt spor and En flyktning går i land, is very good. The grim houses and people of the village Jante in Denmark, where you have to bend you back and work in the local factory, is well depicted, and it is easy to see why Espen Arnakke, brilliantly played by Coster-Waldau, leaves in the shadow of the night to find himself and to be the man he feels inside that he is. (The words of the Jante law, saying that you shall not think you are better than us, you shall not strive to become something and so on are probably Sandemose`s most remembered today)

It doesnt go as he planned however, jumping off ship at Misery harbour, he is tormented by his ship mate John Wakefield, also very well played by Stuart Graham, and finally he ends up killing him deep inside the canadian forests, where they both get work as lumber jackers.

Arnakke has returned to Scandinavia, now in oslo, where he releases a book about his life. Anyone who with reckless abandon retells his life will get up to date, and that is the only real bulwark in this life. This is what he has learned.

What a great movie. Read the book first if possible.