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Another Round (Druk)

From Monday, February 1st, 2021 to Thursday, February 18th, 2021
Details
2020 | Danish w/ English subtitles | 117 mins
Category
Virtual
Film Type
Feature Film
Cost
$12 per household, $10 for Patron members, free for All Access Members

Virtual Ticket

Director
Thomas Vinterberg

Shortlisted for Best International Feature Film: Denmark’s submission to the 2021 Academy Awards

“A breath of fresh air for anyone who has been starving for intelligent entertainment.” ~ Leonard Maltin
With Mads Mikkelsen
Four friends, all teachers at various stages of middle age, are stuck in a rut. Unable to share their passions either at school or at home, they embark on an audacious experiment from an obscure philosopher: to see if a constant level of alcohol in their blood will help them find greater freedom and happiness. At first they each find a new-found zest, but as the gang pushes their experiment further, issues that have been simmering for years come to a head and the men are faced with a choice: reckon with their behavior or continue on the same course.

“Sooner or later, Hollywood will remake Another Round for the U.S. market. It will be a broad comedy about four middle-aged losers who rediscover their youthful zest for life through booze — only to learn, after many pratfalls, that life itself is the greatest intoxicant. They will apologize tearfully to their wives and reconnect with their mortified children. Think The Hangover, but more life affirming.

Another Round is not that movie, because Vinterberg (The Celebration) doesn’t do broad comedy or uncomplicated affirmations. He does claustrophobic handheld-camera work and jarring contrasts. The movie opens with an extended scene in which a gang of teens — the protagonists’ students — holds a beer-chugging race that evolves into a bacchanal. It’s every music video, selling a dream of carefree exuberance — until the director smash cuts to silence and a black screen.

The implication is that every binge must have an end. For Martin and the others, that means being marooned in the desert of middle age. When the men try to recapture their youthful high by getting smashed, separately or together, the soundtrack swells, and the film slips into music video mode again. It’s a high for the audience as well as the characters — until the music cuts out, the consequences set in, and Vinterberg returns to dark, ironic realism.

Viewers will inevitably ask: What’s the message of all this? Is the filmmaker suggesting that people might, in fact, enjoy their lives more and do their jobs better while slightly inebriated? It seems so (Another Round probably isn’t a good watch for anyone trying to maintain sobriety). And yet the film doesn’t gloss over the grave long-term consequences of all that inebriation.

When it comes to mood alterants, Americans tend to want to think in all-or-nothing terms. How can a substance be both helpful and harmful? In my imaginary Hollywood version of Another Round, the characters would eventually discover that true happiness comes not from a bottle or a trick of brain chemistry but from love, family and personal fulfillment.” ~ Margot Harrison, Seven Days