Mitt liv som hund (My Life as a Dog)
Original post date: 9 June 1987
Rating: ✭✭✭✰
This was the big winner of the Golden Space Needle Awards for Outstanding Picture and Outstanding Direction (by Lasse Hallström) at the Twelfth Annual Seattle International Film Festival. Scott Bob gives this flick two thumbs up just for being Swedish and another thumb up because I liked it. It is currently playing in regular theaters, and I urge everyone to go see it. Was it really the best film? I don’t know. It’s not about a Big Issue like The Unknown Soldier or Where To and Back? or even Amazing Grace and Chuck (another film about a little kid). But on its own level, it is as good a film as any of them. You might compare it to Fanny and Alexander except that it’s not as long, it takes place in the 1950s, the kid doesn’t have a sister, and there’s no evil minister or big rescue. Actually, this film is more moving and affecting than any film I have seen by Ingmar Bergman. The protagonist, a little kid named Ingemar, is getting some hard knocks in his early life. His mother is seriously ill, and he ends up getting sent to live with his uncle and aunt in Smaland. Ingemar keeps his troubles in perspective by comparing his situation to that of other creatures less fortunate than he, particularly people who have died really absurd deaths (like the guy who tried to set a record by jumping over 31 cars on a motorcycle and only made it over 30). His mind keeps going back to Laika, the dog the Russians sent up in a satellite and which starved to death in space. Ingemar is kind of a dopey-looking kid, he has trouble sometimes drinking from a glass, and in moments of crisis he is wont to get down on all fours and start barking. But he has incredible luck with women. He has two girlfriends in his uncle’s town (who fight over him) as well as one back in his mother’s town. And those are just the ones who are his own age. His uncle is a real kick. He is constantly working on his “summer house” while listening to the Swedish version of “My, What a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts,” which drives his wife crazy. When Ingemar isn’t hanging out with his uncle, he is visiting old and decrepit Mr. Arvidsson downstairs, who gets his kicks out of having Ingemar read him ladies’ lingerie ads. As the cliché goes, you will laugh and you will cry. Scott Bob says, check it out.
Rating: ✭✭✭✰
This was the big winner of the Golden Space Needle Awards for Outstanding Picture and Outstanding Direction (by Lasse Hallström) at the Twelfth Annual Seattle International Film Festival. Scott Bob gives this flick two thumbs up just for being Swedish and another thumb up because I liked it. It is currently playing in regular theaters, and I urge everyone to go see it. Was it really the best film? I don’t know. It’s not about a Big Issue like The Unknown Soldier or Where To and Back? or even Amazing Grace and Chuck (another film about a little kid). But on its own level, it is as good a film as any of them. You might compare it to Fanny and Alexander except that it’s not as long, it takes place in the 1950s, the kid doesn’t have a sister, and there’s no evil minister or big rescue. Actually, this film is more moving and affecting than any film I have seen by Ingmar Bergman. The protagonist, a little kid named Ingemar, is getting some hard knocks in his early life. His mother is seriously ill, and he ends up getting sent to live with his uncle and aunt in Smaland. Ingemar keeps his troubles in perspective by comparing his situation to that of other creatures less fortunate than he, particularly people who have died really absurd deaths (like the guy who tried to set a record by jumping over 31 cars on a motorcycle and only made it over 30). His mind keeps going back to Laika, the dog the Russians sent up in a satellite and which starved to death in space. Ingemar is kind of a dopey-looking kid, he has trouble sometimes drinking from a glass, and in moments of crisis he is wont to get down on all fours and start barking. But he has incredible luck with women. He has two girlfriends in his uncle’s town (who fight over him) as well as one back in his mother’s town. And those are just the ones who are his own age. His uncle is a real kick. He is constantly working on his “summer house” while listening to the Swedish version of “My, What a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts,” which drives his wife crazy. When Ingemar isn’t hanging out with his uncle, he is visiting old and decrepit Mr. Arvidsson downstairs, who gets his kicks out of having Ingemar read him ladies’ lingerie ads. As the cliché goes, you will laugh and you will cry. Scott Bob says, check it out.
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