24-year-old “Dino” (Bianca Kronlöf) is living in Oslo, one of thousands of young Swedes getting by in low-wage jobs; when a restaurant owner (Henrik Rafaelsen) hires her as a nanny, they have a fling. Ronnie Sandahl’s feature debut shares similarities with Eat Sleep Die (2012), which also had a woman trying to make a living in a foreign country. However, the set-up may surprise Swedes who are not used to seeing themselves being treated condescendingly as immigrants with no means, and some Norwegians who don’t seem to realize that not everyone in Norway is rich. Conventional set-up for a romance, but interesting in this context. Well-written social critique, boosted by Kronlöf’s performance.
2015-Sweden-Norway. 97 min. Color. Produced by Annika Hellström, Gudny Hummelvoll, Martin Persson. Written and directed by Ronnie Sandahl. Cast: Bianca Kronlöf (Anna “Dino” Dinovic), Henrik Rafaelsen (Steffen Dahl), Mona Kristiansen (Ida Dahl), Petronella Barker, Adam Lundgren, Naomi Emelie Christensen Beck.
Trivia: Original title: Svenskjävel.Â
Last word: “I always try to portray politics through personal experiences or personal experiences through politics. I needed to find a way to recount simultaneously the shift in economic and social power between Norway and Sweden, but also the imbalance between men and women and employers and employees. The dysfunctional family that takes on a housekeeper is the perfect context to illustrate all of these relationships. It’s a family drama, but it’s also a proletarian story in a way. I also wanted to create a strange love triangle. The finale shows this and I had that ending in mind ever since I started writing.” (Sandahl, Cineuropa)
