Un pigeon perché sur une branche philosophait sur l'existence

well, you see this is a conflict, conflict about being an ordinary man. and after all being an ordinary man takes you there in which all other people are dealing with just "being". Roy Andersson took care of that approach and made a pretty remarkable movie about "being". Ordinary men try to figure things out, ordinary men try to make friends, earn money, make some jokes, and live on. Joyful moments, sad moments, some bad news and some good news, some misunderstandings and so forth. Actually, the characters show the great determination to continue, a-must-see movie when you are having some existential trouble and something to hold on. Ordinary men have a great solution. Because they don't need to be happy all the time, they don't need to be sad all the time. A smooth way to mix the emotions and keep the balance.

This Scandinavian movie which takes place in an unnamed Swedish town is about bringing joy and laughter to people when there isn't really anything to laugh about. Jonathan (Holger Andersson) and Sam (Nils Westblom) are two joke article salesman, who have only three products: vampire teeth, a canned laughter sack and a frightening rubber mask which they try to sell to resellers. However, the duo is not successful in what they do and so are their – not so funny – products and their uncreative and repetitive sales talk. As they stumble into financial trouble their friendship and business project is about to collapse.

This loose and rather sad story is patched with more absurd incidences. A longer scene takes place in a bar when the young Swedish King Charles XII (1682 - 1718) rides in, as he guides the army to the battle against Russia. Charles asks the handsome barman to come with him to the war. Later, when the army comes home and the war is lost, Charles again visits the bar because he has to go to the toilet. These scenes are not meant to be taken literally but rather embraced as pure images decorated with strange and morbid humor. The world which director Roy Andersson paints for the viewer is drab. There are no colorful things: walls are ocher, bars are gray, the furniture is simple wooden dark brown, and even the faces of the protagonists are white. Nevertheless, the dry jokes, the black humor and the absurdity make the movie fascinating and funny, though a guilty pleasure. Is it really OK to have a laugh or – even worse! – to sell jokes in a world that is so odd, so gray, so dark and sad?

There are two scenes that may have caused uproar but I think not many people made it that far since these scene appear rather late in the film. I won't give it away; you have to find out for yourself. The things that drive common movie goers away are the incredible slow pace of the movie (think of REPULSION (1965)) and the lack of a cohesive storyline. Art seekers on the other side will find an interesting and subtle movie with strange humor that is rarely found.

This, a film about death; its stalking the unready, catching its survivors off guard, delivering problems of succession, needs to be viewed metaphorically. It plays out at a snail's pace and snares you just as death snares its victims. At first, we see the peaceful dove, AKA pigeon, protected by a glass bubble from the attacking eagle (örn) and get a sense of the portents to come. This comes to pass in a most inventive yet phlegmatic study of collective sorrow and fear of loss. Even if you know very little Swedish history, you cannot fail to recognise that the seemingly modern tale of two unsuccessful and troubled travelling salesmen is a metaphor for something else. Poor Jonathan wants never to meet his parents in heaven and is traumatised by visions of unspeakable horror. It is not just lost innocence. We get to see the dreams, the re-enactments of the glory days and the devastating defeat that lives on in the collective memory. Maybe he is a cry-baby. Maybe he has a true 'memory' of the extent of his, and his nation's loss. Quite magical but not your average cinema goer's fare.

Some film makers try to make their films as realistic as possible (the Dardenne brothers, Mike Leigh), and some try to get as far away from reality as they can by creating their own cinematographic universe (Wes Anderson, Jean-Pierre Jeunet). Roy Andersson definitely belongs to the latter category.

The world Andersson shows in his film, is grey, slow, unexciting, and old-fashioned. It reminded me of how eastern Europe must have looked during the communist era. No bright colours, no joy, no laughter, no hope, no ambitions. The interiors are drab, the people dreary. This self-created world is where the cinematographic equivalent of a series of short stories take place. Some are bizarre, most are melancholic, a few are incomprehensible, others meaningless or absurd. But they all share this common characteristic: they are taking place in Andersson's universe.

Actually, that universe is his studio, where he has built all of the sets with incredibly great attention to details, colours, clothing, lighting and lay-out. You can see fascinating images and footage of the production process on Andersson's web site. The sets are the real stars of the film. Even so much so, that maybe the stills of the film (also on the web site), with their Edward Hopper-like melancholy, are better than the film itself.

As fascinating as they are, I don't think the fragments work well as a feature film. They could have been very effective, say, as an element of a daily satirical television programme. But I think watching them all after each other, made into one 100 minute film, is not the best way to appreciate them.

This is my very first review here. I was so impressed that I was forced to register here and tell you all why nobody should miss the masterpiece.

This film pretty much summarizes how it feels to live in the world where 99% of people you deal with are imbeciles. In other words, it gives an accurate description of the state of the world right now. When you think carefully, you understand there is not that much difference between Apple Google whatchamacallit CEOs and those two guys of the film who work in the "entertainment business" and help people to have some good time. You look around and you see the bleakness of the film isn't an overstatement. It actually mirrors our reality in some most perfect manner. No one cares anymore. Nobody's listening anymore. We're tired, exhausted and uninspired. Some guys still make money and have some good laughs - but what's the point making any big fuss about it while the party's pretty much over and the world is doomed to be blown up sooner or later?! The last scenes are brilliant metaphorical statements of the western welfare societies and wrap up this instant classic fantastically.

Check this out and you'll see what I'm talking about, thanks.