|
Breaching Fortress Europe
Lukas Moodysson's Together
and Fucking Åmål, both perceptive and amusing
dramas, were well received by Irish audiences. Neil
Dowling warns them to expect something radically different
from the Swedish filmmakers' bleak new offering, Lilja
4-Ever. [Extract]
"The story of the film came very suddenly to me. It was
like someone had whispered in my ear and said, 'This is the
film that you are going to make and you cannot do anything
else.' It was a surprise to me because I was planning to make
a completely different film."
The story is about a sixteen year old Russian
girl whose mother abandons her when she gets the chance to
escape to America. The girl is called Lilja and she tries
to eke out an existence amid the ruins of a loveless Post-Soviet
society where it is normal for children to sell their bodies
and sniff glue all day to shut out the hell that surrounds
them. Lilja's dream of eventually escaping to the West turns
into a nightmare as she is tricked by a young man she falls
for, and sold as a sex slave. She is brought to Sweden and
kept captive in a run-down high rise that doesn't look much
different to the world she left behind.
Lilja 4-Ever is Lukas Moodysson's third feature film
and marks a serious departure from his last offering, the
brilliant and widely acclaimed Together. Whereas Together,
which depicted life in a hippy commune in 1970's Stockholm,
left audiences in a state of quiet euphoria, Lilja 4-Ever
is devastatingly tragic. All the more so because Lilja's story
is being played out by real people every day. People who are
desperate to escape the vacuum that was left behind by the
collapse of communism, or from the tidal waves of war, poverty
and disease in Africa. The fact of the matter is that human
beings have become disposable, and some more disposable than
others.
The film is littered with betrayals. After her mother leaves
her behind, Lilja's aunt takes over the apartment and evicts
her because it is better than her own place. Even Lilja betrays
the only person that shows her any kindness, a younger boy
called Volodya, who like her has been cast away by his hard
up family. But more shocking than all of this is the way the
rich middle-aged men use her for sex and are happy to pay
the criminal who keeps her like an animal without ever asking
any questions. The film is a wake-up call to those of us in
fortress Europe who have become so comfortable that we prefer
to wallow in apathy than take responsibility for what is going
on in the world. Moodysson is an important filmmaker because
his films, and his art, are inspired not by other films or
art but by life.
After seeing Lukas Moodysson's first feature film, Fucking
Åmål, (released here as Show Me Love)
Ingmar Bergman announced it as the first masterpiece of a
young master. Praise of that magnitude from one of the giant
figures in cinema history could create a burden of expectation
too much to bear. Moodysson however brushed this remark off
like it was dandruff on his shoulder. He explained himself
at a talk he gave in November at The National Film Theatre
in London "I think I am part of a generation where I
don't really have to measure myself with Bergman. I don't
have to love him or hate him. I can be more neutral towards
him. For a long time in Sweden, filmmakers felt the need to
distance themselves from Bergman or be as close as possible
to him. But I haven't really thought about him a lot."
The
full text of this article is printed in Film Ireland
91
|
