When Animals Dream (2014)

Best movie of this year hands down!

As Good As It Gets

Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

When Animals Dream, Danish director Jonas Alexander Arnby's feature film debut, is such a subtle masterpiece that I'm amazed both that it is his first full-length project and that it was hiding in plain sight on Netflix.The opening credits set the tone — gorgeous, almost surreal landscapes and moody nighttime shots that look as though we've just awoken in the pre-dawn hours, bleary- eyed and sleepy — and the film is full of so much symbolism, so many touching moments, that you forget it's horror at all.It is moody and refreshing and soft-spoken, yet bold… as much a coming-of-age story as a horror film. It deals with themes of betrayal, secrecy, grief, misogyny, sexual development, and anger.It follows Marie (a brilliant Sonia Suhl in her first role), a willowy 16-year-old living with her father (Lars Mikkelsen) and physically disabled mother (Sonja Richter) in a small fishing village in Denmark. She starts to notice some odd physical changes — a red rash here, an unusually hairy patch there — and when she is finally shown the connection between her burgeoning condition and her family, she has to make a decision about how to continue with her life…** SPOILERS! **I'm always so pleased when I stumble upon gems like this one. It had been sitting in my Netflix queue for months and I think it almost became invisible after a while… but I finally noticed it again and decided to dive in.It's not very often that you see a werewolf movie with a female werewolf, let alone one that is an adolescent girl. It is commonly — almost exclusively — a man experiencing his teeth sharpening and hair sprouting (An American Werewolf in London, Teen Wolf, Late Phases, etc). So seeing a young girl be the one undergoing the transformation — a condition passed along from her mother, leaving the man of the family as the outcast — was refreshing in a strange way.Marie's change happening in conjunction with her becoming more aware of the world around her and all of its shadows and secrets was perfect. She starts to realize how much her father and her doctor have hid from her — two older men who supposedly know best. She realizes that her mother's inability to do anything besides stare straight ahead in her wheelchair has been thrust upon her as a means of subduing her. She sees firsthand how nasty men in general can be, getting leered at by Esben (Gustav Dyekjær Giese) at the fish processing plant and later pushed into a tub of fish parts as a bizarre welcoming ritual.But she is also becoming more aware of her own sexuality, immediately setting her eyes on Daniel (Jakob Oftebro), another co-worker at the plant. Her shorter temper and increased aggression might be a symptom of her illness, but it's also a necessary factor of not taking any crap, the sole bit of parting wisdom her father, Thor, gives her when she leaves home at the end.So many of the film's most touching scenes are ones that include little to no dialogue, which is such an impressive feat and a combination of incredible cinematography, acting, music, and style. The brief trip that Marie takes with her mother to the ocean, with the waves crashing under an oppressive grey sky… Daniel meeting her mother and squeezing her hand as he says hello… Marie initially showing her father the inflamed, hairy patch on her chest and his expression that is a perfect mix of somber fear and understanding… Marie finding her mother in the bathtub, motionless under the still water… even the night club scene, when not many words were exchanged but the mood is one of wildness finally being let loose.Daniel is a perfect character, such a beacon in the dark. It shows her intuition in a way, since from the first time she laid eyes on him you know that she knew he was good, almost a primal instinct. He is insistent about her beauty and yet patient, he is steadfast, he is loyal, he is committed… even after he watches her murder a ship full of people, he holds her hand and says "I'm right here". He's the glimmer of hope, the proof that there is still good when everything else is going to sh*t.I loved her transforming during their sex scene — it was primal and animalistic while also being sexy and mesmerizing. I initially thought it may end with her killing him, some deep, not fully understood desire taking control of her, but I soon saw that he was alive and well and knew he was there to stay.They kept her transformation subtle, natural in an odd way. She doesn't turn into some kind of animatronic beast or an almost cartoonish caricature. She looks more human than animal, like some kind of hybrid or a sophisticatedly evolved wolf. Her small size makes her seem an unlikely predator — same with her mother — but we soon see it just makes her more nimble.I just loved every bit. I loved the strong feminist undertones. I loved Marie's character becoming more defiant and confident with every scene, leaving behind any fear or apprehension in favor of strength and a little bit of healthy rage. I loved the stunning cinematography and the music that perfectly enhanced every scene without distracting or overpowering. Amazing!

I tried "When Animals Dream" evening-before-last. I tried it again the next morning, then, the afternoon, and I finally finished it this evening. I want to thank the movie for helping me sleep..."When Animals Dream" is a very slow-paced--almost boring--attempt to tell a story of a young girl experiencing changes to her body and mind. What those changes are and why (or how they develop) are never explained. The story begins when Marie is in her doctor's office for a checkup. The doctor says he needs to do a little more blood tests before he can make a diagnosis. In the meantime, Marie has begun work at a local fish cannery, and hair has started to grow on one boob. She's pranked at her job, she flirts, she smokes, she works, she's sexually harassed, she's confused, she dances, she gets drunk, she falls for someone. Bored yet? I know I was. I'm not sure anything could have helped "When Animals Dream." Perhaps, a little more action, but this snooze-fest left me feeling nothing. There is no character development. I felt nothing for Marie because the movie never developed her character. You're just given a bare-bones look at a woman changing. "Ginger Snaps" was MUCH better.Rated "R" for a hairy boob, adult situations, and mild violence. Not recommended. NOTE: In Danish with sub-titles.

A twist to a theme already seen many times, but is an original contribution. Through concise and fair dialogue, we can see a clear intention not to give everything chewed to the viewer, not explaining everything that happens (which came out very well in my opinion).The lead actress does a fine job. Perhaps a rewriting of the myth of the werewolf, perhaps a metaphor for the animal in us, maybe a social critique to the aggression that the horde develops when something is different and frightens us. Probably all that together. I liked the point made by the father/mother and father/daughter relationship in the context of the situation they are living. Either way, it's a movie with original features, beautifully set in a rural town in Denmark, and with decent special effects.

As a Dane I hate to say it, but most Danish movies are pretty bad. And what's perhaps even worse: a lot of Danish (and now also international) movie critics still give these movies positive reviews. This is certainly the case with this movie, which, while perhaps not especially bad, is certainly not especially good, either. But hey, Danish movies and TV shows are in vogue these days. With enough support and praise, these products of Denmark might well begin to get better in due course."When Animals Dream" is about a provincial fishing village, where a 19-year-old girl is beginning to find out about her mother's strange disease, which necessitates keeping the mother sedated in a wheelchair like a vegetable. The girl, Marie, has inherited the disease, and starts very (very) slowly turning into a werewolf. And SHE won't be sedated.Sonia Suhl, a new young actress, is good as Marie, and a very good fit to play the daughter of Sonja Richter, who plays the mother. Lars Mikkelsen as the father is also fine. But the movie as a whole is slow-moving and laconic, giving too few clues about when and why things happen, and while well-produced in some ways, it is too obviously low-budget in others. The rest of the cast are not well-developed.Now, the great stable of Danish film-making, which almost always ensures a project being financially supported by the Danish Film Institute, is social realism. This movie is stuffed with it, as well, and hasn't got that much werewolf action in it, which is a pity. If you're a genre fan, it's a little bit yawnsville. Or a lot.There are two ways to interpret the movie. One is that Marie's turning into a werewolf represents a coming-of-age journey and sexual awakening. That's how mainstream critics understand this movie.However, if you look at the movie in terms of the fantastic genre (which I believe is much more proper in this case), the artistic twist is that the werewolf represents true and beautiful human nature, which is being destroyed and actively suppressed in provincial dumps populated by repressed, conservative bigots. All things considered, though (such as how powerful the movie is, or rather, isn't), this is not a particularly original or progressive message, but simply a moderate one.Sadly, even though I see a dimension to the movie that most of the gushing professional critics (that I've read so far) apparently do not, this is in my view still not a movie that goes much beyond tedious mediocrity. The story is too small, has too little to say and doesn't add anything substantially new to the genre. It has all the typical hallmarks of Danish movies, perhaps best exemplified by the sparse, ill-at-ease and artificial dialogue which sounds completely unnatural. Foreign audiences should be thankful that this is not apparent to them. Denmark is a small country, and we are so deeply suffused with Anglo-American culture that our own language is becoming unbearably stilted, especially in scripted drama.Having said this, one must applaud the effort to make a werewolf movie in the first place, and while failing to arouse much excitement in this viewer, it's not a complete failure. Perhaps this director's next movie will be more interesting.I rate "When Animals Dream" 6 stars out of 10, although parts of me incline more towards 5.