Lars von Trier is BACK BACK BACK with a movie so funny, so clever, so brilliant that I can almost forgive him MANDERLAY. Leaving behind all the ludicrously pretentious stripped-down super-didactic nonsense of the past few years, Trier goes back to his crazy-comedic KINGDOM HOSPITAL days. He even announces at the start of the movie that we are simply in for a good time - a bunch of laughs at the expense of the arty-farty crowd. But of course, as ever with Trier, the movie is not as simple as all that. You can take it as a light-hearted comedy and that's fine - but it is also a very funny and sharp satire at the expense of the movie-director/actor relationship and the restrictions of the comedy genre.
The movie is filmed in a near Dogme style - all natural settings, minimal lighting, zero production design and unpolished photography and deliberately jumpy editing. Given all this, in combination with the deadpan humour, it feels a lot like a more brilliant Danish version of the hit UK comedy series, THE OFFICE. Coz what we have hear is a fly-on-the-wall look inside a small Danish IT company. The actual owner of the company is a loveable teddy-bear of a man called Ravn. Needing a scapegoat for the unpopular management decisions he's forced to make, he invents a "Boss of it all" who works in the US and forces Ravn to do all the bad stuff. Now, Ravn wants to sell the company to a hysterically anti-Danish Icelander and rake in the proverbial phat cash. So he hires an an ueber-luvvie actor to play the role of the boss of it all. There follows a lot of situational comedy around the mistaken identity and the actor going off message and off-script.
What can I say? This is funny - it's clever. I have no idea when it will get released in the US or UK but you absolutely HAVE to check it out!
THE BOSS OF IT ALL goes on release in Denmark on December 8th 2006. It just played London 2006. It goes on release in the UK on February 29th 2008.
The movie is filmed in a near Dogme style - all natural settings, minimal lighting, zero production design and unpolished photography and deliberately jumpy editing. Given all this, in combination with the deadpan humour, it feels a lot like a more brilliant Danish version of the hit UK comedy series, THE OFFICE. Coz what we have hear is a fly-on-the-wall look inside a small Danish IT company. The actual owner of the company is a loveable teddy-bear of a man called Ravn. Needing a scapegoat for the unpopular management decisions he's forced to make, he invents a "Boss of it all" who works in the US and forces Ravn to do all the bad stuff. Now, Ravn wants to sell the company to a hysterically anti-Danish Icelander and rake in the proverbial phat cash. So he hires an an ueber-luvvie actor to play the role of the boss of it all. There follows a lot of situational comedy around the mistaken identity and the actor going off message and off-script.
What can I say? This is funny - it's clever. I have no idea when it will get released in the US or UK but you absolutely HAVE to check it out!
THE BOSS OF IT ALL goes on release in Denmark on December 8th 2006. It just played London 2006. It goes on release in the UK on February 29th 2008.
If it's better than The Office it must be brilliant :-D
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