Kitchen Stories
Picture: B-
Sound: B- Extras: D Film: C+
Can a Swedish researcher only view the daily life of a
Norwegian farmer without interacting, intervening or getting involved? In research to improve domestic living, no
matter how ridiculous it makes people look, the con that it will make for a
“better tomorrow” is constantly bantered about. In Bent Hamer’s Kitchen Stories (2003), the researcher
finds that doing such a job on location is tough, and being in the house makes
the requirements all the more impossible.
This reaches its apex of insanity when the researcher is
sitting in an adult height chair, which speaks volumes about the whole
situation to boot. Many will think of
The Coen Brothers’ Fargo (1996, reviewed elsewhere on this site), but it
is nowhere as interesting and the film ultimately plays this for light laughs,
instead of going more deeply into the situation and all of its
possibilities. Hamer also wrote the
screenplay and is responsible for the form and path the film takes, on top of
helming it. In this, he takes the safe
road, never daring to explore the deeper existential questions the film starts
to pose, and then quickly abandons.
The anamorphically enhanced image is in a strange 2 X 1
frame, the measure of which comes from who knows where. Though not loaded with great detail, the
color is of a sort of aquamarine nature throughout, as shot by cinematographer
Philip Ogaard. This as a sort of
natural color for the environment of Sweden by the filmmakers’ standards, but
oddly not too far removed from the gaudy and forced colors of the products of
the future and the set-ups meant to celebrate them. The surreal images mix in to make this visually interesting, even
when all else fails. The only extras
are trailers for this film and the general MGM line-up, which is also
disappointing. I would love to hear
Hamer talk about (i.e., explain) what he thought he was saying, or was it in
ideas only he understood? You might
get some light laughs out of this, but is it really worth the 95 minutes of
haystack to find them?
- Nicholas Sheffo
