Ousdal, Sverre Anker

The Secret Life of Words

In the Secret Life of Words, a wounded man and a hearing impaired woman forge an unlikely relationship that transcends romance. They reach an understanding that speaks as much for the affection they hold for one another, as it does their need to simply be recognized. Academy Award winner Tim Robbins (Bull Durham, The Shawshank Redemption) stars opposite Sarah Polley (The Sweet Hereafter) in this emotional drama directed and written by Isabel Coixet (who also collaborated with Polley in My Life Without Me). Polley plays Hanna, an emotionally-stilted factory worker who is forced to take a vacation. Instead of jetting off to the Caribbean or the South of France for some sun, Hanna opts for Northern Ireland where she is hired to work as an oil rig nurse, despite the fact that she may never have actually had any medical training. Robbins portrays Josef, a chatty burn victim who is left temporarily blind, but still has enough life in him to flirt with Hanna. She would rather turn down her hearing aid and make as little contact with others as possible. Slowly, the two share secrets and help each other recover--him physically, her emotionally. While the burgeoning love story is a bit implausible, the film does a good job in exploring two characters with complicated backgrounds. --Jae-Ha Kim

Academy Award winner Tim Robbins stars in this compelling film from Pedro Almodovar, the renowned director of Volver and Talk to Her. Powerfully acted and critically acclaimed, The Secret Life of Words is a moving story about discovering love and hope when least expected. A wounded oil worker forms an unlikely and emotional relationship with a nurse based on his need to divulge the secrets of his past and her mysterious silence about her own identity. Jack Mathews of the New York Daily News calls it "remarkably compelling…one you won't soon forget."

Kitchen Stories

A Swedish researcher strikes up an unlikely friendship with a cranky Norwegian farmer in this "quirky thoughtful and bittersweet" (Boxoffice) comedy that captured audiences' hearts around the world. Both "warm" (Newsday) and witty Kitchen Stories is "a deadpan thoroughly delightful comedy that cooks up tasty laughs" (New York Post)!It's thei1950s and a Swedish efficiency expert under strict orders not to interact with his subject is sent to improve a Norwegian farmer's culinary efforts. But the sly old farmer much prefers to amuse himself by impeding the timid researcher's work! Soon in the struggle between neutral observation and the need for human interaction the kitchen becomes a battleground!System Requirements: Running Time 95 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: PG UPC: 027616919571 Manufacturer No: 1007910

The Island at the Top of the World (30th Anniversary Edition)

There's magic in the memories as great Disney moments are captured right here for you and your family to enjoy. An American archaeologist joins a rich English businessman, an eccentric French inventor, and an Eskimo trapper on an awe-inspiring search for a long-lost son. What they discover is a world forgotten by time in the grand fantasy adventure tradition of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells, and alive with Disney's trademark spectacle, romance, and comedy!

Insomnia - Criterion Collection

This 1997 film from Norway and neophyte director Erik Skjoldbjærg delivers the goods with unsettling effectiveness. It's an intense, smart, and taut thriller if only because what it eerily implies is creepier than the film's reality. Opening with a churning, chilling murder of a young woman, Insomnia invites the viewer--as well as its protagonist, celebrated Oslo homicide cop Jonas Engström (Stellan Skarsgård)--into the mind and thoughts of a killer by making Engström fatally flawed himself. While in pursuit of the murderer, Engström makes a mistake; he accidentally shoots his partner and friend and covers up his deed in a panic. But he overlooks a minor detail: the real killer has seen him commit the crime. What ensues is a layered, complex, and unnerving descent into chaos, brought on by the inability to sleep in this land of the midnight sun. Engström suffers from insomnia, which warps his logic and resolve, and before long he's totally unraveled and unsure of his every move. But not before a twisty transference and countertransference occurs between cop and killer. The two play a game of high-stakes one-upmanship that surprises in the end. Insomnia is fresh and psychologically bent, full of Scandinavian despair and dark humor, and it boasts a film noir pulse beneath its blinding light. --Paula Nechak

Disgraced Swedish detective Jonas Engström (Stellan Skarsgård) travels to northern Norway to solve a brutal murder in Insomnia. Unable to sleep through the night of the midnight sun, Engström quickly loses his grip on the case and his mind. Erik Skjoldbjærg's debut feature is a deft amalgam of psychological thriller, morality play, and police procedural. Criterion presents the DVD premiere of Insomnia in a new widescreen transfer.

The Last Place on Earth

Kristin Lavransdatter

Based on a novel by the Nobel Prize-winning author Sigrid Undset, Kristin Lavransdatter tells a love story set against the backdrop of 14th-century Norway. After her childhood sweetheart is killed, Kristin (Elisabeth Matheson) enters a nunnery to postpone her arranged marriage to a man she doesn't love. On a trip to town, she meets Erlend (Bjørn Skagestad), who is immediately smitten with her. Though she discovers that Erlend is in disgrace, she falls in love with him and they find themselves in carnal embrace. Against all social and religious forces, they struggle to make their love possible. Directed by Liv Ullmann (director of Private Confessions, star of Ingmar Bergman's Persona and Cries and Whispers), the movie benefits from its richly realized depiction of medieval life. Despite her limited status in this world, Kristin is no blushing maiden; when she repels an attempted rape by bashing her attacker's head with a stone, her face has the fury of a warrior queen, and her passion for Erlend is all-consuming. Kristin Lavransdatter may be too reverential toward its source material to have any consistent vigor as a film, and it's a bit of a soap opera (the religious intensity at times verges on the Gothic), but at its best it has a rawness that captures the pain and joy of life (and love) in brutal circumstances. Beautifully filmed by the great cinematographer Sven Nykvist (whose credits range from Autumn Sonata to Sleepless in Seattle). --Bret Fetzer

This epic love story set in 14th-century Norway is Liv Ullmann's (Faithless) remarkable adaptation of Sigrid Undset's 1928 Nobel Prize-winning novel. Kristin Lavransdatter follows one woman's decision to break with tradition to marry the man she loves rather than the man her father has chosen for her. Torn between her longing for love and her sense of family loyalty, she ventures into a life filled with passion and pain, joy and sorrow. The star of many Ingmar Bergman films (Scenes from a Marriage, Autumn Sonata), director Ullmann collaborates here with cinematographer Sven Nykvist (Cries and Whispers) to create a film as visually entrancing as Bergman's finest. Her insightful exploration of medieval society captures the essence of life throughout the ages.

Hamsun

Director Jan Troell's biography of Norwegian, Nobel Prize-winning author, Knut Hamsun (Max von Sydow), is as much about Norway's experiences with Hitler as it is about Hamsun's personal life. Opening with a scene that establishes Hamsun's torrent relationship with his wife, Marie (Ghita Nørby), the film examines the couple's gradual conversion to Nazism, as Germany occupies Norway during World War II. Persuaded by a Nazi embassador sent to Oslo, Vidkun Quisling (Sverre Anker), both Marie and Knut become spokespeople for the Nazi Party, justifying their politics by the German promise of a strong, independent post-war Norway. As the Hamsuns discover the hushed horrors around them, their own personal relationship falls away, forcing them to reflect on their lives, their dysfunctional children, and their mistakes. Known as a traitor in Norway, Knut Hamsun, in this film, is portrayed as a true Norwegian patriot, proving, through Hamsun's own words, that his misdirected desire to aid Hitler had nothing to do with anti-semitism. A sad beauty permeates Hamsun. Just as the author sentences himself, the viewer musters up enough sympathy for Hamsun to learn that, indeed, the personal is political. --Trinie Dalton

In this epic story of love and treason, Max Von Sydow gives a career-crowning performance as Knut Hamsun, Norway's controversial Nobel Laureate, who stunned the world by becoming the only major European artist to side with the Nazis in WWII. Max Von Sydow brilliantly captures the loneliness and confusion of the last seventeen years of Hamsun's life, as he faces the consequences of his outspoken support of Nazi politics in Norway.

Knut Hamsun, a staunchly anti-British nationalist, was his country's most beloved writer, best known for his modernist books Hunger (1890) and Growth of the Soul (1917), which gave Norway's literature worldwide stature. But with the shadow of Nazism quickly darkening Europe, Knut Hamsun and his wife Marie embrace Hitler-- who sees Hamsun's support as the surest way to win over the Norwegian people.

Hamsun never learns German so his speeches are interpreted-or mis-interpreted by others, including his frustrated, former actress/author wife Marie--played brilliantly by Ghita Nørby (Babette's Feast, Sophie, The Kingdom). Before long Hamsun and Marie are engulfed not only in Hitler's war, but also in their own turbulent relationship, and the angry wrath of a betrayed nation. After the war, instead of being jailed for treason, Hamsun is ordered to undergo months of intense psychiatric evaluations and a court trial that almost ends both his relationship with Marie and his life.

Mio in the Land of Faraway

The Island at the Top of the World

Insomnia

This 1997 film from Norway and neophyte director Erik Skjoldbjærg delivers the goods with unsettling effectiveness. It's an intense, smart, and taut thriller if only because what it eerily implies is creepier than the film's reality. Opening with a churning, chilling murder of a young woman, Insomnia invites the viewer--as well as its protagonist, celebrated Oslo homicide cop Jonas Engström (Stellan Skarsgård)--into the mind and thoughts of a killer by making Engström fatally flawed himself. While in pursuit of the murderer, Engström makes a mistake; he accidentally shoots his partner and friend and covers up his deed in a panic. But he overlooks a minor detail: the real killer has seen him commit the crime. What ensues is a layered, complex, and unnerving descent into chaos, brought on by the inability to sleep in this land of the midnight sun. Engström suffers from insomnia, which warps his logic and resolve, and before long he's totally unraveled and unsure of his every move. But not before a twisty transference and countertransference occurs between cop and killer. The two play a game of high-stakes one-upmanship that surprises in the end. Insomnia is fresh and psychologically bent, full of Scandinavian despair and dark humor, and it boasts a film noir pulse beneath its blinding light. --Paula Nechak