I was expecting the Pelle character to be Max Von Sydow... anyway the boy Pelle hardly measures up to Von Sydow, but this is only one of this movie's shortcomings.
To begin, it is much too long. Clip the school scenes. The schoolmaster's role is inconceivably bad and his flock of sex-obsessed children is not only obnoxious but would make Freud himself squirm in his grave. Also, the daughter, and all scenes related to her sub-plot, should be cut. This role adds very little or nothing and seems inserted only to supply the sex/beauty demand. Drop a few other flat characters too---and you drop an hour from the movie.
Speaking of "Pelle's"characters, apart from Lasse (Von Sydow), they all seem to share an inert quality. It's as if they inhabit a Scandinavian winter scene painted by a second tier artist--beautifully set, but filled with people as props. Some are too stereotypical, some too gray, some too general---as if belonging to a wide-angle picture and not to a movie. And although the mother and Eric are potentially convincing and interesting characters it's as if their lines have been loaned out to them. In this sense, "Pelle" is too much like a TV movie.
Another kind of stereotype is the strong association here of poverty and farms with a kind of animal sexuality. The youngest child to the very old seemed to be defined more by a mindless sexual interest than by any other. I mean since when do 5-10 year old kids gang up on adult sexual behavior? Then there's the baron (and son to a point) who can never pass up a chance to roll in the grass and hay with their indentured farmhands. And does the mutilation material really fit an already morbid movie? I've scored "Pelle" a 6, but believe it closer to a 7 (7.8 needs to be countered) The movie, I think, does have three strengths, with the first overshadowing the other two.
Max Von Sydow's acting is exceptional, and it alone is worth the price of the ticket. Whatever problem there might be with his role, he overpowers it. He is utterly convincing as someone fated to poverty on one side and age on the other. Victimization seems to have seeped into his mind, spirit, and body. He calls on no tricks, and never deviates from the character he inhabits whether as a man cowering before the powerful wieldings of his masters, or buckling under one more shattered dream. He is as certain of himself as a proud and determined immigrant as he is as a broken and debilitated man. And he inevitably carries the movie's truth about oppression and discrimination on his back.
Photography is another positive. The Danish landscape, the isolated world of a large farm, the centering big house, the natural world of farmland and seascape, and the snowy winter scenes all add realism, romance, atmosphere, and a sense of place which so often seem lacking.
Finally it is rare to view so original a father-son relationship as the one portrayed here. It can teeter into sentimentality at rare moments--the boy actor is not Von Sydow---but the unabashed closeness between the two is remarkable. No matter how many falls from grace his failure to defend his son may entail, Lasse is a protective and truly loving father.
To begin, it is much too long. Clip the school scenes. The schoolmaster's role is inconceivably bad and his flock of sex-obsessed children is not only obnoxious but would make Freud himself squirm in his grave. Also, the daughter, and all scenes related to her sub-plot, should be cut. This role adds very little or nothing and seems inserted only to supply the sex/beauty demand. Drop a few other flat characters too---and you drop an hour from the movie.
Speaking of "Pelle's"characters, apart from Lasse (Von Sydow), they all seem to share an inert quality. It's as if they inhabit a Scandinavian winter scene painted by a second tier artist--beautifully set, but filled with people as props. Some are too stereotypical, some too gray, some too general---as if belonging to a wide-angle picture and not to a movie. And although the mother and Eric are potentially convincing and interesting characters it's as if their lines have been loaned out to them. In this sense, "Pelle" is too much like a TV movie.
Another kind of stereotype is the strong association here of poverty and farms with a kind of animal sexuality. The youngest child to the very old seemed to be defined more by a mindless sexual interest than by any other. I mean since when do 5-10 year old kids gang up on adult sexual behavior? Then there's the baron (and son to a point) who can never pass up a chance to roll in the grass and hay with their indentured farmhands. And does the mutilation material really fit an already morbid movie? I've scored "Pelle" a 6, but believe it closer to a 7 (7.8 needs to be countered) The movie, I think, does have three strengths, with the first overshadowing the other two.
Max Von Sydow's acting is exceptional, and it alone is worth the price of the ticket. Whatever problem there might be with his role, he overpowers it. He is utterly convincing as someone fated to poverty on one side and age on the other. Victimization seems to have seeped into his mind, spirit, and body. He calls on no tricks, and never deviates from the character he inhabits whether as a man cowering before the powerful wieldings of his masters, or buckling under one more shattered dream. He is as certain of himself as a proud and determined immigrant as he is as a broken and debilitated man. And he inevitably carries the movie's truth about oppression and discrimination on his back.
Photography is another positive. The Danish landscape, the isolated world of a large farm, the centering big house, the natural world of farmland and seascape, and the snowy winter scenes all add realism, romance, atmosphere, and a sense of place which so often seem lacking.
Finally it is rare to view so original a father-son relationship as the one portrayed here. It can teeter into sentimentality at rare moments--the boy actor is not Von Sydow---but the unabashed closeness between the two is remarkable. No matter how many falls from grace his failure to defend his son may entail, Lasse is a protective and truly loving father.