Greenes Please don't spend money on this.

Comwayon A Disappointing Continuation

filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

maurice yacowar Jens Lien's dystopian dream is as Kafkaesque a film as I can recall. The solitary hero Andreas moves through an inexplicable world, sterile, corporate, irrational, and his physical suffering — a lopped off finger, several run-overs by the subway — disappear magically. The urban landscape is grey, concrete, a world stripped of taste, colour, smell, any sensual engagement. The sex is easy but empty. He assumes ardor where there is only bemusement. He has an easy success at work as well as with women, nice office, sports car, nice flat, easy affairs. But his dissatisfaction reawakens when he remembers sensations, when he misses children. The corporate and Ikea-furnishing city is a kind of penal colony. Escape is impossible. When he digs a tunnel into a colourful kitchen in the outside world, he's dragged back with but a mouthful of Danish."Everyone here is happy," he is admonished, before he is brutally carried out and dumped into the more problematic but enlivening reality.The opening shot is of a couple in a subway station kissing ravenously. Andreas watches them, unsettled not so much by their passion — we will later deduce — but by their disengagement. Their mouths work as if sucking out lobster but their eyes keep springing open as if even that pretence at passion can't make them feel alive. The film excoriates the welfare state which provides the basics in a deadeningly easy way but stifles individual assertion.

itamarscomix Labeling Den brysomme mannen as a comedy or a fantasy is misleading, but the film is nevertheless both hilarious and dream-like in its atmosphere. It's a Kafkaesque nightmare, funny and disturbing at the same time, and it successfully draws the viewer into a dream-like haze and puts you in the shoes of the lead character, a fish out of water in an eery plastic utopia. The film works on two levels - immersing the viewer in the experience for the duration of the film, while satirizing modern western society and specifically the perceived coldness and detachment of city life in Norway.The film starts out incredibly strong and judged by its first two acts, it could have been one of the best films of the year; unfortunately it loses some wind in the last act, and allows the satire to lose its subtlety and become much more prominent than the atmosphere, throwing the viewer right out of the immersion built up during the first half and losing a lot of impact. Some scenes, especially the subway scene and the finale, are too over-the-top for anybody to be able to still be in the protagonist's shoes. And so, the last half hour make it a very good film rather than a great one, but still it's a fascinating and unusual film that will make you laugh and cringe, beautifully shot and well-acted, and well worth the time.

strandedinoslo First of all, forget all the Christian stuff (heaven, hell, purgatory). You are in Norway.The director intended well to show it is shot in Oslo, it is easy to recognize the places. It is a sharp look at the values that rules the country and at the lack of sentiments and feeling of the Norwegian society.Note that Andreas - does he arrive to Oslo by his own will - does not really has a job, but a place in the society that give him access to "happyness": - an apartment - a convertible - friends from the work place - a girl, who has only interest for kitchens - another girl who cannot say I want but only I may The girls are cruelly described, but again the 1st one is the typical Norwegian "witch" (sorry to use this word, I translate literally from Norwegian) and the second the everyone's girl friend; both are typical characters of the Norwegian society.Andreas has other values, is sensitive and want to make choices: warm chocolate and children.It is deep buried in the cellars of the old buildings of Oslo housing old people; the room at the end of the tunnel is a typical grandma Norwegian kitchen.The soundtrack is Peer Gynt, almost the Norwegian national anthem, adding again to that lost paradise's nostalgia.The final scene is shot at the house of common of Oslo and the people coming out of the building are meant to be the deputies or minister of the country and they tell Andreas that they did everything to make him happy, if I remember correctly, just before expelling him.Although Andreas injures himself to show his feelings,the gore scenes may seem strange here but maybe the director use it to mock the conformity of the Norwegian cinema, as it has been mandatory for the last decade to show very violent scenes in almost every movie.Is the bus also a typical character of the Norwegian society? I wonder because for celebrating the end of the studies , the Norwegian students have "party buses" this ritual marks the entering into the adult life, and Andreas coming from nowhere in a bus to this town. what do you think?

troche-5 The Bothersome Man is a smart, surreal movie that makes you reevaluate what you're doing with your life and what makes you tick. When you see these people in zombie like trances doing everyday events and realize that's what we do and what we want in real life it really hits close to home. This is a surprisingly effective movie that at the end leaves you asking questions about your direction and not so much the movie. Andreas is the main character whose life we get a 3rd person view of as he tries to adapt to a new life after being relocated. In the beginning he seems to be the most popular guy in town as everyone at work caters to him and he's invited to dinners etc. A good example of this is in the scene with his new boss who offers him an envelope of an unspecified amount of cash saying "here's a little something to get you started". Andreas even gets a girlfriend 20 minutes into the movie, which he eventually moves in with. This seems like an ideal living situation as his girlfriend is an established interior designer, attractive, and doesn't ever nag about anything he does. But Andreas is unfulfilled with their relationship as with everything else in this world. He then begins an affair with a coworker named Ingeborg who he eventually leaves Anne for and claims he is in love with. After telling Ingeborg how he feels she tells him that she is also seeing other coworkers and says all of the relationships are "nice". Soon after we see Andreas at a train station where he tries to end his misery and to the audience's disappointment doesn't come about. Still looking for salvation Andreas meets Hugo who has found a hole which music can be heard coming out of. So they embark on a mission to get to the other side, will it be better or will it be worse? "The Bothersome Man" shows us society's obsession with appearances and its materialistic mindset. It does a great job making fun of us by filling homes with IKEA products that the characters spend each lunch picking out. I think he is mostly poking fun at the dull Scandinavian society and its high suicide rates. For example there is a scene in the movie where Andreas comes across a man who jumped out of a building and onto a spiked fence. Also, Andreas fed up with this world cuts his finger off and then later jumps in front of a train; this is one of the most weirdest/outrageous scenes I've seen. This world created by Lien is equivalent to purgatory where there is no punishment or reward. In this world drink after drink Andreas never got drunk, sex was unfulfilling, and no matter how many times he tried he couldn't kill himself. This movie reminded me of "Fight Club" and how both main characters were kind of out of sync with the world around them. In "Fight Club" Tyler Durden creates a second persona that does everything he wouldn't and in this movie the awakened Andreas is the equivalent to Tyler Durden. After a while he wakes up and tries to escape the bland life he is now apart of by escaping through a hole in a wall. Lien does a great job with continuity in this movie meaning when a character has a half full cup in his hand and they cut away then come back they have the glass in the same hand and its not full or empty showing that the shot was done another day. Nowadays directors are more worried about the sound effects and overlook the little things like is that character wearing the bracelet on the same hand as yesterdays filming? Since I took TV Production for three years in high school it's hard for me not to look for continuity or voice overs which drive me nuts. Lien does the little things well he's got great lighting in each shot, never leaves you wondering why something is in a shot and brings about an interesting topic. This film really worked for me because it not only mocks Scandinavians' but the western society and what's wrong with it. The only real issue I had was with the man who commits suicide by jumping on a spiked fence. Because you eventually find out this world has no death but he laid motionless forcing you to assume he was dead and this never gets answered in my opinion. Andreas is the only main character as others come and go and never do more than support his him. His first girlfriend Anne Britt is an interior designer who at the surface seems perfect for him but eventually turns out to be dull. This leads him to Ingeborg who he starts an affair with and falls in love with. He soon finds out that she was with a handful of other men and that what he felt was not real. Andreas eventually meets Hugo in the bathroom of a bar complaining about how nothing tastes good anymore and how he can't even get drunk anymore. He follows Hugo home to find the hole in the wall with that is filled with children's laughter and birds chirping. Lien doesn't have a lot on the resume but "The Bothersome Man" is more than a jump start to a great career but a preview of an up and coming director. If this is any indication of his talent and potential as a story teller, Lien has a bright future and we can only hope that his future movies don't take so long to make it overseas for our viewing pleasure. So take a seat and enjoy the ride as Director Jens Lien takes you from the comfort of your home to the dreamlike world that is "The Bothersome Man".