The first outing for Rapace since her role of Lisbeth Salander in the Millennium trilogy is a family story in more ways than one: her real-life husband, Ola (the couple have reportedly now split), plays her character's husband, and their children are played by real-life siblings.
This no doubt partly explains the piercing emotional authenticity of the drama. Director August, a noted Swedish actress, makes her feature debut here in a domestic drama whose tone the word "bleak" rather seriously understates.
Rapace's Leena is a wife and mother called back to her hometown on the Baltic coast when she learns her long-estranged mother is dying. (The fact that the woman has concealed the existence of her family of origin from her husband and kids goes unremarked). The reason for the estrangement is filled in via flashbacks in which the past is seamlessly joined with the present. It ain't pretty - take a look at the classification and be warned - but there's no denying
that it's very well done.
That's mostly down to the real star of the show, teenager Tehilla Blad who plays the young Leena (she played the young Lisbeth Salander too). The youngster perfectly captures the heartbreaking mix of perplexity and insatiable hope that characterises children who are inadequately loved, and the even more disturbing process by which they assume too young the responsibilities that adults around them have ignored.
If the ending seems a bit glib, it at least offers a moment of hope in a film that is pretty short on that commodity. It's in the Scandinavian psychodramatic tradition that joins Ingmar Bergman to Susanne Bier and it's brilliant in its way - but it's not after delivering a nice night out.
Stars: 3.5/5
Cast: Noomi Rapace, Ola Rapace, Tehilla Blad, Ville Virtanen, Rasmus Troedsson, Junior Blad
Director: Pernilla August
Running time: 94 mins
Rating: R16 offensive language, domestic violence In Swedish and Finnish with English subtitles
Verdict: Bleak and brilliant
- TimeOut
Movie Review: Beyond
Swedish movie Beyond starring Noomi Rapace. Photo / Supplied
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