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The Kingdom (1994)

Director: Lars von Trier, Morton Arnfred

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From Time Out Film Guide

This mordant blend of hospital soap, occult schlocker and social satire makes David Lynch seem prim. Set in a Copenhagen hospital, it's a farce which puts a dead man's grip on the clichés of TV soap opera. The fun comes partly from the deadpan performances - from Järegård's consultant, a universally loathed Dane-hating Swede, to Rolffes' Mrs Drusse, a career patient determined to exorcise from the building the unquiet spirit of a murdered girl. No opportunity for going over the top is missed, no ethical interdict is left untransgressed, no sensibility untrammelled. As a social indictment, it's structured in tiers, from the top-floor, which houses the administrators' Masonic lodge, to the building's bowels, in which work the dishwashers, savants with Down's syndrome who function as an eerie Greek chorus. Shot in breathless vérité-style, and marked by von Trier's customary jaundiced tone, it's a compulsive, bizzarely plausible witches' brew of interweaving storylines, conspiracy theories and paranoiac visions, held together by manic conviction right up to its Grand Guignol finale.

Author: WH 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide

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Cast & crew

Director: Lars von Trier, Morton Arnfred

Producer: Ole Relm

Cast: Ernst-Hugo Järegård, Kirsten Rolffes, Ghita Nørby, Søren Pilmark, Holger Juul Hansen, Annevig Schelde Ebbe full cast

Genre(s): Comedy

Duration: 279 mins


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