Review of Force Majeure (2014)
Seen in 2017.
A man runs away from an avalanche, leaving his wife and kids behind.
Excellent B-roll. Unfortunately, the technocratic coldness and cynicism of the shot composition and of the drone and electric toothbrush scenes merely imitate the superficial features of Michael Haneke and the like, without the underlying compassion of the better directors, or of the original A Doll’s House (1879). The pivotal notion that a human being should be judged by their behaviour in a state of panic is weak, akin to the IAT technique for measuring bias; indeed this suggestion is made by the character of Mats, but actively undermined in every other part of the script. For that I prefer Lord Jim (1900). Among overly clean Swedish contemporary hotel-themed cinematic interrogations of the modern condition, I prefer Hotel (2013).