AFTER THE WEDDING (Efter Bryllupet) Reviewed by Harvey S. Karten
IFC Films
Grade: B+
Directed by: Susanne Bier
Written By: Anders Thomas Jensen, from the story by Susanne
Bier and Anders Thomas Jensen
Cast: Mads Mikkelsen, Rolf Lassgard, Sidse Babett Knidsen,
Stine Fischer Christensen, Christian Tafdrup, Mona Malm,
Neeral Mulchandani, Meenal Petal
Screened at: Review 1, NYC, 2/26/07
Opens: March 30, 2007 Although "After the Wedding" was one of the five Oscar
nominees for films the opened in 2006, the general public are
more likely to remember its principal performer, Mads
Mikkelsen, as 007's card-playing villain in "Casino Royale."
His character is the last guy you'd hire as a furniture designer,
particularly if you're looking for the odd chair or two. While you might expect Mr. Mikkelsen to whip out a deck of cards at any moment, he’s playing for even bigger stakes this time–both money-wise and emotionally. His character, Jacob, is negotiating a deal that could result in a foundation grant of twelve million dollars. Perhaps more important, the deal could provide further redemption for a life he spent in more youthful days, one only alluded to but not visually told in his dissolute background of drinking, drugs and womanizing, for which he had already atoned in great measure by good deeds as a manager of an orphanage in Bombay for the past twenty years. Still strikingly handsome and a chick magnet, as we can see as the story progresses, Jacob has chosen a saintly life and appears chosen for even greater deeds by an enormously rich man back in Denmark, Jorgen (Rolf Lassgard), who strikes us in the audience as a duplicitous individual who thinks he can buy off anyone he chooses, including Jacob. Filmed by Morten Soborg in Mumbai and Denmark, with dialogue in Hindi, Danish, Swedish and English, director Susanne Bier’s film scripted by Anders Thomas Jensen from a story by Jensen and the director soars above the soap opera it could have been thanks to magnetic performances and an arresting script. “Efter Bryllupet,” as the pic is named in its original Danish, finds Jacob urged by an orphanage supervisor, Mrs. Shaw (Meenal Petal), to go along with Jorgen’s insistence on traveling to Copenhagen to meet a potential donor in person. Jacob is reluctant to leave the children for even a week, particularly since he could miss the birthday of his favorite child, one who is presumably his own, eight-year-old Pramod (Neeral Mulchadani). In Copenhagen, Jacob and Morgen meet and, invited to the wedding of Jorgen’s daughter, Anna (Stine Fischer Christensen), Jacob finds that he recognizes Jorgen’s lovely wife, Helene (Sidse Babett Knudsen). The anagnorisis is electrifying–a life-changing event that takes the two back decades, one of those events which, to coin a cliche, will change their lives forever. Close-ups abound throughout the film, creating a sense of intimacy, even to the point of distress. The characters are feeling queasy, ill-at-ease at something that occurred far back, yet personal history has a way of intimating itself into the present in surprising ways. Sometimes the most disagreeable events can turn into happy resolutions. If Mad Mikkelsen comes across as usual as the accomplished performer, Rolf Lassgard scores heavily as an actor who convinces us at first of his character’s arrogance, and gradually has us warming up to him. We see that beneath his gruff, swaggering, I-can-buy-you exterior lies a lonely, frightened, vulnerable billionaire. Not Rated. 119 minutes 2007 by Harvey Karten
Member: NY Film Critics Online | 
