Force Majeure

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Ruben Ostlund/Starring: Johannes Bah Kuhnke, Lisa Loven Kongsli, Clara Wettergren, Vincent Wettergren and Kristofer Hivju

Force Majeure takes us to so many surreal and wonderful places one might not expect from a film set at a ski resort in the French Alps. Amid breathtaking alpine tableaus and eerily deserted hotel interiors plays a fascinating psychological drama.

Though the film begins with a Swedish family's seemingly mundane ski trip, what slowly unfolds is the wife's alarm at what she perceives is a lack of masculine and fatherly resolve in her husband, which the film uses as a springboard to examine society's perceptions of said masculinity and the male's role as protector in parenting and times of crisis. How society demands its males to be unreasonably heroic in life-threatening situations, despite the very powerful human instinct for self-preservation is a theme very much on Director Ostlund's radar.

The opening scenes of the family being photographed on the slopes of a ski run is a family in its deceptively happy moment of repose. During a mid-day meal on the hotel patio, with a soaring and stunning but ominous snow-packed mountain filling every patron's view, we hear the howitzer-like report of the air-cannons that create artificial avalanches to control dangerous accumulation of snow. As a ferocious wall of snow rushes with frightening velocity down the mountain and toward the lunching patrons, we hear the patron's fearful cries. And as the avalanche smashes forcefully but harmlessly into the building, the dining area is enveloped in a blinding fog of snow and mist, creating a white-out. From behind the powdery curtain we hear the terrified shriek of the parent's daughter and the anguished cries of other patrons.

The scenes following the near-catastrophe show the family resting and returning to the more pleasurable concerns of their vacation. But as the topic of the near-disaster is broached, Ebba (Lisa Loven Kongsli) the wife and mother, begins questioning and censuring her husband Tomas (Johannes Bah Kuhnke) for not coming to the aid of his children during the avalanche's harrowing moments. Tomas rationalizes his behavior, which lays the foundation for more resentment.

Intertitles track the passing days of the vacation as Ebba's shame for her husband's behavior begins to consume her; sometimes finding expression at inconvenient moments. During a dinner with a man and woman who the couple casually meet on the slopes, Ebba's anger and animosity bubbles then erupts, drawing the bewildered couple into the radius of her invective.

The avalanche-incident continues to haunt Tomas and vex Ebba which leaves the children to endure emotional, collateral damage.

The images that accompany the drama are often surreal, casting the narrative in something simultaneously real and fantasy-like. Ski-lift rides pass silently against white, snowy backdrops in which all color and objects are washed from the screen, creating a kind of white void. Medium and long shots of the hotel's interior are equally strange and often reflect the point-of-view of a mysterious maintenance man; a voyeuristic audience-of-one whose silent observations of the family are oddly comical.

The couple are soon joined by their friend Mats (Kristofer Hivju) and his girlfriend, who are soon subjected to Ebba's angry avalanche account of Tomas' supposedly selfish, un-manly regard. Mats defense of Tomas comes off as desperate pleading rather than cogent support for his friend's actions. Later, while Mats and his girlfriend lie in bed, reflecting on Ebba's accusatory tirade, he endures the same challenge to his manhood when she makes a provocative statement about how Mats might react in an identical crisis.

As the vacation drags on, the family begins to emotionally unravel, which prompts Ebba to manufacture a crisis; a kind of machismo test Tomas must pass to regain his wife's respect. And in the final sequence, during a nail-biting bus ride down the mountain, Tomas' earns a measure of vindication for his seemingly unforgivable act of cowardice during the avalanche.

Ostlund's thoughtful examination of heroic masculinity is absorbing and asks much of our critical thinking. The title, which literally means superior strength is an ironic nod to the themes on male gender roles Ostlund pursues through most of the film.

I found the film absorbing and the characters superbly portrayed. Kuhnke and Kongsli offer searing performances while Kristofer Hivju's striking appearance of wild, viking-like red hair and raging beard make him seem like some ideal of manhood sprung forth from the couple's imagination.

Beautifully shot, the alpine milieu is like a alien moon from the far side of Saturn. The wintry abyss that threatens to engulf the family also leaves us with the odd illusion of them being untethered to any earthly reality. Sound also plays a key role in the film. The booming sounds emitted from the air cannons are a jarring contrast to the eerie silence that blankets the mountain.

There are many metaphors and themes to parse, which Force Majeure offers in psychological abundance. Ostlund's film is a cerebral adventure with a few moments of hair-raising terror to keep an audience rapt and engaged. It's also a complete film; one that stimulates analytical thought and rich, deep emotions.