Movie Review

Directed by Lone Scherfig, starring: Andreas Berthelsen, Anette Slovelbaek, Ann Eleanora Jorgensen, Peter Gantzler, Lars Kaaluna Sara Jensen, (Danish subtitled) 1 hour 39 mins, 2002.

This is a story about Interim Ministry. No, really! And, it's also a Romantic Comedy with lots of pathos. You will likely find it in the 'festival flics' section of your video store.

Andreas goes to a small congregation to fill in while the pastor is under suspension. He arrives bearing some tragedy since his wife has recently died after a long illness. The parish assistant is an ex-junkie and robber who had visited Andrea's wife in hospital.

Several story lines and relationships converge at the local parish and at a local adult education class, Italian for Beginners.

Andreas lives in the local hotel ("I won't be staying long") and strikes a friendship with the hotel manager, Jorgen Mortenson, who, in a remarkably short time, reveals to Andreas his, (Jorgen's) problem of impotence. Jorgen is the friend and boss of Helvfinn (Finn) who is the manager of the restaurant. Jorgen is instructed by his boss to fire Finn because of his insulting treatment of customers. Finn meets and falls in love with Karen who is a hair stylist but each time he goes to get his hair cut there is an incident with her mother that requires Karen to leave the shop. Her mother is an alcoholic who is dying in extreme pain and Karen under extreme pressure, relieves that pain with an overdose of morphine. Olympia works in a bakery and cares for her ailing and cantankerous father. The family story is that her mother abandoned the family to pursue a career as an Italian opera singer. The stories converge at the church through a number of funerals. At one of them the hairdresser and bakery clerk discover that they are in fact sisters who have cared for single parents not knowing of the other's existence. Olympia's mother, far from being an opera star was a pathetic drunk.

All these lonely people also attend Italian class. (It is well known that socialization is a major motivational factor in adult education.) Alas, their teacher has died and the class is to be cancelled until Finn steps in to lead it. He is a fanatic football fan (Juventus) and he teaches them such valuable Italian phrases as 'the goalie', 'the penalty', 'the throw in' and 'to whistle'. Three love stories slowly emerge. Finn and Karen are the most passionate of the couples and the most troubled. She bears the secret of her mother's dying. He is a rough diamond who is both angry (he is an orphan who grew up living under the stadium bleachers) and incredibly compassionate to Karen when he learns of her mother's death. Andreas and Olympia is an unlikely couple given their social distance. His declaration of love involves selling his Maserati. (There are different standards for compensating Interim Ministers in the Danish State Church!) Finally, there is Jorgen and Giulia. She is Italian, worked with Finn until he was fired and has lusted after his friend Jorgen for some time. She prays fervently to The Virgin Mary that Jorgen will notice her. It all comes together when Olympia surprisingly, receives an inheritance from her father and spends it all on taking the Italian Class to Venice.

Andreas is a wise and compassionate pastor for someone so inexperienced. It is a treat to see a cleric portrayed as a somewhat comic character but not a buffoon or charlatan. Clearly, the pain of his own loss is the source of compassion and understanding. He has an angry confrontation with his predecessor who has never recovered from the loss of his own spouse, a loss that has soured him on life and prompted his loss of faith, as well. Andreas does not trump the pastor's pain with his own story but makes a simple articulation of how one carries on in the face of loss.

Early in his ministry Andreas preaches a very intellectual and propositional sermon that prompts an angry reaction from a parishioner who storms out of church. Later, he agonizes over notes for another sermon and these notes form the theme of the movie. "It is in loneliness that God seems furthest away. But God is here; in compassion; in friendship; between us; inside us; in love; in every moment; in the arm you slip around the waist of your beloved."

Not surprisingly, the promo notes on the video box catch the theme of loneliness but miss the theological dimension that is the very point of the story.