Six months ago, I came across a Dutch movie unwittingly as I stood outside a remote movie hall in New York City. Released sometime in 2007, this movie was titled "Kærlighed på film".The English Translation: Just Another Love Story.
One glance at the poster told me it was anything but that. A man, stands with a gun drawn over a dead man in a pool of blood. Time wasn't wasted. Tickets were bought. Seats occupied.
The movie begins like promised with a series of numbered love scenes. Except that it was hardly love. It begins with the protagonist Jonas's narrative of how it all ends and then we are thrown into his life as he struggles through a slightly sickening job and a boring wife and kid, when he suddenly meets the femme fatale Julia through an accident. The accident leaves Julia injured and comatic. Jonas makes his way to the hospital to be misunderstood by her family as her boyfriend.
When his feeble attempts to clear the misunderstanding fail, Jonas finds himself being handed a wet sponge to wipe the naked and comatic Julia's body with clear instructions to clean between her armpits and legs. And thus begins a strange, erotic, cruel, ambivalent and sometimes funny journey as he claims to be who he is not, and leaves the life that was originally his, suddenly and unwittingly drawn into a passionate love, an exotic fantasy and a forbidden life.
And as we follow him through a sensory overload of events, we are both repulsed and strangely attracted to his actions. The guilty pleasure of enjoying something really despicable. There is always a woman, the protagonist says, and there is one here. One, we are as much mesmerized with, as is the protagonist. Cleverly written, the characters often dwell in the intricacies of metafiction. A woman and a mystery are the ideal ingredients of a movie, one of the characters says sarcastically. A good shot, says the protagonist in another scene which is a classic film noir shot if any ever is.
The background score is brilliant, alternating between a slow haunting acoustic guitar, to a symphony of sorts as we move through the protagonist's life. The script is fresh and pulsating with energy as we laugh one second and are repulsed the very next. If a movie can make you grimace, laugh and bite you nails with apprehension and wonder at the intelligent sharp exchange of dialog, it is one that has managed to make its mark. This particular movie has surpassed the mark.
Acting by the lead characters is ace. The confrontation scene between the protagonist and his opposite number is fletched out stunningly. Fragments of each life are shown to you, and as you put everything together and move towards what is a stunning climax, you realize somewhat surprised, that this movie is exactly what it promised to be.
Just another love story.
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