Louder than Bombs **** (2015, Jesse Eisenberg, Gabriel Byrne, Isabelle Huppert, Devin Druid, Amy Ryan, David Strathairn) – Movie Review

Exquisitely handled, tenderly performed, touchingly heartfelt family drama of a father (Gabriel Byrne) and his two sons Jonah and Conrad (Jesse Eisenberg, Devin Druid) forced to confront their different feelings and memories of the boys’ dead war photographer mother (Isabelle Huppert).

Three years after her death, an exhibition celebrating Isabelle Reed brings her eldest son Jonah back to the family house, forcing him to spend more time with his father Gene and withdrawn younger brother Conrad. American-style Bergman angst ensues. The father is so distraught that he can’t get through to the silent, evasive Conrad that he resorts to stalking him.

Co-writer/director Joachim Trier’s heart on sleeve film is overflowing with inner torment and anguish, as damaged lost souls get bared in that particular American way, though in fact Trier is a Copenhagen-born Norwegian.

Amy Ryan and David Strathairn beef up the acting chops as Hannah and Richard. These are all first-rate actors, of course, but they are working at the top of their game. Eisenberg and Byrne are particularly striking, though the way less experienced Druid impresses too.

It was honoured, or at least respected, as the first Norwegian film since 1979 to be featured at Cannes Film Festival in the main competition, where Trier was nominated for the Palme d’Or. The screenplay (Trier, Eskil Vogt) and cinematography (Jakob Ihre) are notable and classy. It needed prizes to get noticed, but didn’t. It’s the kind of film that just slips through the net and is easy to overlook, so an effort has to be made to know about it and see it. It thoroughly repays this effort.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Movie Review
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