Ya, Odd Horten. And guesties.

Y'all lucky, you get two posts for the price of one today. Our good friend Jake over at the Tartar Sauce (a more reputable blog of pop culture and all that is good) hooked us up with a little guest post gig. So for thoughts on up, direct your attention that-a-way. For strange yet pleasing Norwegian films, you've come to the right place.

It never really feels like I'm home until I see a foreign or indie movie at the local indie theater, so you could call this our homecoming review. Welcome back to the wonderful world of little-known joy and rewarding cross-cultural immersion. Forgive what could sound pretentious. Our movie today is "O'Horten," a very strange and dreamlike movie that is also deeply pleasing in an odd way (and no pun very much intended). The movie chronicles the adventures of Odd Horten, a Norwegian train conductor who has just retired. That's basically all there is to a premise; the rest of the movie follows Odd on the path that retired life takes him, occasionally funny and occasionally meditatively symbolic. The entire movie moves at a very subdued rate, and nothing is really explained, yet the beautiful images and unusual charm of Odd and his journeys yield a very consistent sense of wonder and pleasure. This is proving a very difficult movie to review, because like a dream the individual qualities tend to pale in description, while all that is left is a vivid memory. The amusing scenes are usually awkwardly incongruous, like a situation when Odd is detained while passing through an apartment (to get into the building he had to enter another apartment via scaffolding) and ends up falling asleep, only to be awoken by the family's morning routine. Or the retirement festivities, where the train engineers perform a bizarre chant and then sit around trying to guess the model of various trains by recorded sounds. Then there are moments that seem to be extremely pensive or spiritual, like an involvement with a lively old drunk who proves to be more mysterious than he lets on, or a sequence where Odd brokers a deal to sell his boat. And the images... lots and lots of trains and snow and slow, peaceful movement with twinkling lights in that profound northern darkness. This is bewitching filmmaking; all that prevents this from being a perfect movie is the mystery, which I certainly wouldn't change because it makes the film as wonderful as it is, although probably transient in the memory as a dream. Either way, definitely worth the watch. It is a very subtle and Scandinavian movie, and the lilt of the Norwegian dialogue is almost as comforting as the end feeling of peace. Retirement is certainly an adventure, but not one with explicit goals or understanding, and this story is glorious.

I still haven't forgotten about Pac vs. Biggie, and I also have a review of "Drag Me to Hell" pending, although the experience was overwhelming so I need time to figure out an angle. All together there's a pleasant sense of busyness around here, so stay tuned.