Kristian Petri, the director of 'Bad Faith', is a very interesting director, not least when it comes to documentaries.
He has also directed some episodes of one of the most popular tv-series in Sweden, 'Skärgårdsdoktorn'.
I very much appreciate his documentaries like 'Brunnen', about Orson Welles and Welles' 'relationship' with and profound foundness of Spain or Petri's film 'Detaljer' ('Details').
In this film, however, we again ('again' as it seems to be a recurrent theme in Swedish film these last few years), meet a cowardly, cynic and frightened human being, afraid of being involved in something that might "disturb her circles". I would say a Swedish trait but perhaps universal?
The main character, Mona (Sonja Richter), witness a bestialic murder, approaches the victim but leaves him to die, instead of trying to help. Similar situations emerge and she reacts in the same way.
After being interrogated by the police - who suspect her of being involved or at least find the fact that she appears in connection to these murders somewhat strange - experiencing that they don't believer her, she decides do reveal the murderer herself.
In fact she does not only aim at revealing the murderer but she becomes obsessed by him, being less interested in saving lives and more interested in the psychological circumstances behind his behaviour, driven by the tickeling feeling accompanying her 'private investigation'.
To many obviously planted details and coincidences making her look suspect, render this film an aura of being to carefully prepared, at the same time making the outcome to predictable, as the real murderer turns out to be someone else than her 'object of study'.
The predictability in connection with the obsessed and, to a certain degree, unbelievable behaviour displayed by the colorless female main character, with a plot on the boundary between fiction, verity and dream makes it a less interesting oeuvre than the above mentioned films by Petri.
He has also directed some episodes of one of the most popular tv-series in Sweden, 'Skärgårdsdoktorn'.
I very much appreciate his documentaries like 'Brunnen', about Orson Welles and Welles' 'relationship' with and profound foundness of Spain or Petri's film 'Detaljer' ('Details').
In this film, however, we again ('again' as it seems to be a recurrent theme in Swedish film these last few years), meet a cowardly, cynic and frightened human being, afraid of being involved in something that might "disturb her circles". I would say a Swedish trait but perhaps universal?
The main character, Mona (Sonja Richter), witness a bestialic murder, approaches the victim but leaves him to die, instead of trying to help. Similar situations emerge and she reacts in the same way.
After being interrogated by the police - who suspect her of being involved or at least find the fact that she appears in connection to these murders somewhat strange - experiencing that they don't believer her, she decides do reveal the murderer herself.
In fact she does not only aim at revealing the murderer but she becomes obsessed by him, being less interested in saving lives and more interested in the psychological circumstances behind his behaviour, driven by the tickeling feeling accompanying her 'private investigation'.
To many obviously planted details and coincidences making her look suspect, render this film an aura of being to carefully prepared, at the same time making the outcome to predictable, as the real murderer turns out to be someone else than her 'object of study'.
The predictability in connection with the obsessed and, to a certain degree, unbelievable behaviour displayed by the colorless female main character, with a plot on the boundary between fiction, verity and dream makes it a less interesting oeuvre than the above mentioned films by Petri.
