Image provided by the Sydney Film Festival
Queen Of Hearts took home the prestigious Audience Award (World Cinema – Drama) at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival back in January, and ever since it has been touring the globe with curators programming it into countless other festival line-ups – just this week it plays in both Sydney and Romania, where it is up for the Transilvania Trophy at TIFF 18. Trine Dyrholm is on ever-reliable, magnificent form as Anne, a married mother of twins who starts an affair with her teenage stepson Gustav (Gustav Lindh) after he travels from Stockholm to Norway to live with her, his father Peter (Magnus Krepper) and their two girls.
May el-Toukhy’s film, which she directs and co-wrote with Maren Louise Käehne, is a hefty two hours long, but it’s all-consuming nature, dynamic performances and unpredictability make for a largely engrossing watch from start to finish.
We open to Krepper’s Peter stood in his lounge, bag packed, Dyrholm’s Anne coyly looking over him as he informs her that he must travel to Stockholm immediately after being notified by the local police that he is urgently needed – for what he, and we do not know. There’s ice-like tension between the husband and wife, Peter fleeing without so much of a kiss goodbye. The next scene and everything that follows is set prior to this – a spring setting a huge contrast the dense, dank conditions of the opening frames – what we assume to be the following winter. We quickly learn that Peter’s son is due to come and stay – the troubled teen’s mother Rebecca, who we never see, no longer able to cope.
Gustav is a typical, difficult teen, though we do find out that he’s been involved with the police back in Sweden. When Anne and Peter’s house is ‘burgled’, questions are asked and the young teen is told to buck up his ideas by Anne, and involve himself with the family – particularly with his two step-sisters; something that he actually responds to. Anne is stuck in a jumbled, stale marriage and is almost buckling under the pressure of juggling a highly intense job as a lawyer and ensuring that her precious two girls get all the joys of a good childhood, with good schooling and ensuring that they can attend their extracurricular activities. Peter, a doctor, is constantly away and it is during one of his trips that this highly illicit affair with Gustav begins.
Related: In Fabric review [Sydney]
Queen Of Hearts is clearly a morality tale, one littered with ironic contradictions, and I largely enjoyed it. It’s an interesting spin and I can totally understand why it has done so well on the international festival circuit. Dyrholm has never been better and she’s supported by a cast that equal her commanding presence. Lindh also impresses in an often muted performance but comes totally into his own with some hugely demanding scenes late on. The cinematography by Jasper Spanning is often dizzying but always striking, and there’s also a ravishing score by Jon Ekstrand.
The film does feel – at times – too long. While I understand why May el-Toukhy takes her time with the narrative, I can’t help but feel that the feature would have benefitted from a slight trim in places. There’s also – in my mind – a totally gratuitous, sexually explicit act halfway through which I also couldn’t really understand its presence, but again, this is just my view.
All that said, there’s an interesting conversation to be had after seeing the film, and although I saw the movie a couple of days ago, it’s still with me. A very accessible piece, hence it striking a chord with audiences, full of spot-on performances from everyone involved. Certainly one to see if it lands near you.
Queen Of Hearts was reviewed at the 2019 Sydney Film Festival.
