Neils is urbanized man at his very worst: a dedicated surgeon, husband to busy wife Marie and screaming out for a mid-life crisis. Their troubled teenage daughter, Stine, inadvertently causes their lives to collide with Joachim, a student and extreme sports fan, and his fiancée Caecilie.
What follows is a rare on-screen glimpse of the messy combinations of luck (good and bad) and co-incidence that make up real life. The fall-out from the initial car crash seems obvious as Joachim (Nikolaj Lie Kaas) lies paralysed in hospital. However Kaas displays an intensely unpleasant streak as Joachim struggles to recover and his actions become increasingly inscrutable to Sonja Richter's rather childlike Caecilie. Her heartbreakingly desperation for communication and physical contact is beautifully expressed through several underplayed fantasy scenes.
In Neils, Mads Mikkelsen has fleshier background material to work with. His ideal life is, of course, not destined to continue and an ill-advised attempt to offer compassion results in the inevitable unlikely affair with Caecilie. It may not be a new idea but Mikkelsen and Caecilie certainly bring something fresh and sympathetic to their characters' infidelity. Paprika Steen is also impressive as Maria, a largely reactionary character to pit against Neils and Stine (a very real performance from Stine Bjerregaard).
Director Susanne Bier works within the Dogme 95 framework to instruct her simple use of camerawork ensuring few distractions from the uniformly strong central performances. Even melodramatic moments seem authentic within the film's nicely inconvenient reality (there's no such excuse for the misguided opening heat-sensing shots)..
Despite it's downbeat tragedy/infidelity plot, Open Hearts is a surprisingly enjoyable film. It's also a powerful reminder of just how good a film can be when you take away the usual faff and nonsense, and just let talented actors do their job.
Copyright © Nicola Osborne 2002-2005
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