Boring

Beautiful, moving film.

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

(Flash Review)After 25-30 minutes, I could take no more and I turned it off. Something I rarely do. From cut #2, I was annoyed, lost, bored as it was unable to clearly or convincingly communicate anything worthy enough to hold my attention. It felt distractingly low budget. Each character was irritating and hard to relate to. The scenes were strange, which is why it earned 2/10 yet they sadly amounted to nothing. Avoid at all costs.

This could be a good test to identify the top one percent of art house movie fans. For an average movie goer this film is a real hell to sit through. Don't expect a fun movie by looking at the "comedy" tag. It is an absurdist comedy, set in a bleak, gloomy city filled with pale people who are somehow devoid of humanity. It will leave a bitter taste in your mouth and probably haunt you. I myself wasn't in the mood for such a thing at the time I watched it and didn't enjoy it at all but I can see why some people like it. While I wouldn't give songs from the second floor a very high rating I suggest Roger Ebert's positive review, it sums up this movie pretty well.

Unique, funny, brave look at the capitalist bureaucracy slowly destroying Swedish society, told through a series of beautifully photographed absurd and surreal vignettes. (Organized religion takes some lumps as well).The camera never moves, and each scene is a story told in a single wondrously composed and art-directed shot. Some pieces are more powerful than others, some funny, some tragic. But this is bold, adventurous filmmaking. Even it's failed moments are more interesting than most modern 'successes'. It's fascinating to see how much Andersson's style changed since his great first success 'A Swedish Love Story' 30 years earlier. That film was a subtle, naturalistic, wonderful look at young love. Here he creates what one critic aptly labeled 'Monty Python meets Ingmar Bergman'. I'd throw in ex-Monty Python Terry Gilliam's 'Brazil' as well. If that sounds at all interesting to you, check this out, as well as Andersson's equally terrific follow up, 'We, The Living'.(Note, the pace is very slow by modern cinema standards. but I found myself pulled into it, the way one is by good poetry).

I saw this movie at a theater in Stockholm, and i am really sorry, but when 1/3 of the audience starts booing and leaving the place in the middle of the movie, it wont go to the history as a fantastic film. The reason I saw it was off course the GREAT criticism it received by all the Swedish critics, the creme de la creme of movie lovers, as they say.I, painfully, saw the whole movie, but since about 2 minutes into the movie I wanted to leave and so did almost everybody in the theater. I've talked to so called "smart" people about this movie, and they say that it has a deep meaning, about the everyday stress that drives people crazy, but all I really think is that this movie is totally crap. Do not see this movie. You will feel bad afterward. Roy Anderson makes fantastic commercial movies though =)