Together

This one is certainly the best movie I've watched in my life. Casting is so natural, and the movie touches many aspects of life from politics to family disputes. Göran has the hardest job in the "family" and hardest job as far as acting is concerned. But he's totally successful. When you watch the movie, you feel like he's acting his own life. The "open relationship" between Göran and his girlfriend, the friendship between the two youngsters, and social/political issues give the movie a lot of spice. Moodyson's another movie, Fucking Åmål (Show Me Love) is also a masterpiece, but this one is more suitable for older people. Briefly, tremendous content and flawless casting.

When I bought my Lukas Moodysson 4 disc boxset, this being the second DVD in it, little did I realise that I had in fact seen Together many years before and many parts had lodged in my memory and so it was a huge pleasure to see it again - and actually own it now, too.

It's a lovely multi-faceted film that can be watched intently, or as I'm doing this time, just picking up the bits and characters I want to follow. Few movies successfully allow such freedom, at least in still giving us an overall picture. So totally un-Hollywood, with as much natural everything, including (refreshingly, these days) body hair - and I mean ALL body hair that it's impossible to get embarrassed by any of the open and frank attitudes to sex, the (now) ridiculous clothes and the Communist lifestyle of the 'Collective', as it prefers to be termed (not commune).

Battered housewife Elisabeth leaves her husband Rolf with her children and is promptly thrown into the very strange but comforting cushion as is the Collective, as Rolf pours all the alcohol down the drain and attempts to contact his wife. Slowly, through reunions with the children, they paint their view on their new life, which, as you can imagine, is often hilarious. Whether they get back together as a family unit is definitely not for me to say, though and the varying shades of this aspect is yet another of the film's delights.

Because everyone is so natural, nothing is surprising, yet individually, in another film and with a different director, many scenes would just be too way-out and off-beam. Similarly, we almost want to join them, as common-sense is painlessly drawn from us and we are enveloped by these rather strange but peculiarly likable people.

Moodysson extracts enormously natural and relaxed performances - you'd swear much of it is a documentary, yet the camera always expertly follows and ends up just where it should be, swiftly but gently. The children in particular, especially when playing is a wondrously warm treat; they're just like all kids everywhere, totally oblivious to the camera.

Together is an offbeat gem, it might not be for everyone but for anyone with a heart and soul and a wholesome attitude to life, it definitely will be.

Göran is making porridge. For some reason this prompts him to deliver an improvised musing on the theme of Life Is Like a Bowl of Porridge, which goes roughly as follows: "We start as individual oat flakes, each with an individual shape; then we're heated and mixed and we start to blend together with all the other oat flakes; we're no longer oat flakes, but we're part of something larger - something warm, nutritious, and, yes, beautiful." Göran says this as though he's trying to convince himself. And no wonder. The porridge the camera reveals to us looks like repellent glomp.

And up until that point - well, up until a little before that point; the film's arc is like a long walk up a very gentle hill and it's hard to pick the precise moment at which we make it to the top - the collective seemed just as much a dollop of repellent glomp as the porridge. There were too many people too close together, the windows were never open, and for long stretches we never stepped outside, never even caught a glimpse of the outside. Every single room looked and felt as though it were buried in the very centre of the house. It was like living in a fetid warren, and it made me long for something cold and impersonal.

But even as we're gasping to escape we're being won over. In the end the film really IS warm, and it's the pleasing warmth of a fireplace rather than clammy warmth of porridge. The joyousness Moodysson concludes with grew so naturally out of what preceded it that the glow it casts is retrospective. I can't recall a single moment which I don't NOW (having seen the whole thing) recall with fondness.

The LOOK of the film is, in a quiet way, astonishing, except that it's so convincing you forget to be astonished. You'd swear it was shot in the 1970s. (When I saw the trailer I thought was watching an ad for the reissue of a movie that HAD been shot in the 1970s.) This is as great a triumph of art direction as any you're likely to see.

If you've ever suspected that Pippi Longstocking was a capitalist pig, Lukas Moodysson's film is for you. Set in Stockholm in 1975, this revisiting of those not so halcyon good ol' days brings us up close and extremely personal with a cast of appealing characters living close to their ideals while remaining quite human. Apparently communal life isn't all vegan dinners, late-night Marxist dialectics, and Joni Mitchell singalongs-even in Sweden. The film beautifully records the residents' foibles through the eyes of their children, who serve as the group's conscience. A disturbing, funny, moving and ultimately upbeat look at the utopia we all hoped could exist.

Together is a story of human relationship. As one character says at one point in the film, "I'd rather eat porridge together than pork chops alone", and that is the recurring message throughout the film. Our story takes place in a commune in 1975, which is called, you guessed it, 'Together'. The commune serves as the crux of the movie; it's the centre of the film, and the people that inhabit it are what surrounds the central habitat. The film really starts when Elisabeth has a fight with her husband and leaves him, with the kids to live at the commune, which is owned by her brother; the far too kind, Goran. From there, the film just takes off; the multiple personalities that inhabit the commune are each allowed to grow and be nurtured by the audience, no one character is similar to another and they all have their own strengths and weaknesses. Just like he did in his masterpiece; Show Me Love, Lukas Moodysson creates characters here that are real and that we therefore are able to feel for and like for being people, as opposed to just because they're the central characters. It's this realism that gives Together its edge over most other human dramas, such as In America or Whale Rider.

Lukas Moodysson delivers a film here that works on a multitude of levels. The moments of drama are spot on, and because each of the characters gets to develop and we get to know them, it makes the drama more powerful than it would have been if this were not true. It's amazing, actually, just how many characters Moodysson is able to juggle in this film. In many films with a lot of characters, some end up being left by the wayside and not having a chance to shine but all the ones here do, and that is a testament to Moodysson's writing abilities. The acting on display here is an exhibition in excellence, and nothing that the actors do in the film feels odd or out of place. It's almost like watching a real commune. Just like he did with Show Me Love, Moodysson has opted for a gritty style to his film, which doesn't make the film look nice, but it does give it a very rough edge, which is what the film needs; it wouldn't have been the same with an aesthetically pleasing feel. Moodysson's direction in the film is very detached and it almost feels like a documentary. This is a good thing, as with this Moodysson allows the audience to make their own mind up about what is happening on the screen. He never piles on the sentiment, or condones or discourages any of the acts in the film; they're just they're, and you can choose whether they are moral or amoral; which is exactly how a drama of this ilk should be.

Overall, Together is an excellent piece of film. The character development and the way that the characters are handled alone makes it a must see, but the excellence doesn't end there. Moodysson has created a film here that is as entertaining as anything you're likely to see and with a definite message. Moodysson can make rubbish for the rest of his life and still be warmly remembered for this and Show Me Love.