52 Films by Women Vol 8. 26. Kalak (Director: Isabella Eklöf)
Some directors
struggle with that ‘difficult’ second movie. However, Swedish-born
co-writer-director Isabella Eklöf puts ‘difficulty’ front and centre. The bulk
of Kalak, the follow-up to her 2018 debut, Holiday, and adapted from Kim Leine’s 2007 confessional memoir, takes place in
the challenging sub-polar environment of Greenland in the late 1990s, where its
protagonist Jan (Emil Johnsen) works as a nurse. Jan was abused as a child by
his father and as an adult exploits the loneliness of the local population. He
confesses his infidelity to his wife (Asta Kamma August), who for reasons not
explained chooses to stay with him raising their two children. Jan shares a
meal with the family of one woman with whom he has sex. The family knows he is
married but don’t reject him. Jan explains himself as being in thrall to his
feelings. He lives moment by moment, exuding a warped brand of kindness.
Greenland rarely
features in movies, except as a destination for Gerard Butler and his screen
family when disaster strikes. An autonomous territory in the Kingdom of
Denmark, it is closer geographically to North America than to Europe. The
mostly Inuit population has much in common with the Native American, including
– judging by the film’s setting - somewhat impoverished blue-collar lives. Most
of them live on the Southwest coast. Eklöf does not try to explain the country
or offer an opinion on it. Rather, the location allows Jan to be as far as
possible away from his father, whose letters he chooses to ignore. Jan’s wife
knows nothing of the abuse Jan experienced.
The first scene
presents this abuse in an explicit manner, taking place in 1984, when Jan is a
teenager – almost an adult. Father (Soren Hellerup) comes to sit next to him
while Jan is asleep. ‘Someone’s had a wet dream,’ he tells him before reaching
down into Jan’s pyjama trousers. Eklöf leaves nothing to the imagination as
Father pays his compliments and satisfies himself, ostensibly under the pretext
of giving pleasure to his son. Eklöf follows it with a classroom scene of a
late middle-aged woman applying red and black paint to her face and lumps to
her checks before she acts out a mating ritual, squatting and inspecting the
men and women seated on the floor in a circle. The performer is more Bonobo
monkey than human as she illustrates our fascination with predatory behaviour -
the expression of discernment. She describes the ritual as blending comedy,
tragedy and the kingdom of spirits. There is nothing particularly comic or
spiritual in Jan’s coming to terms with his trauma, except perhaps the final
scene - dark but undoubtedly restorative.
There is more. In
direct address to camera, reading out one of his letters, Jan’s father reveals
that he has cancer; we discover later it is of the throat. There is no pity in
his voice. As we discover, Jan’s father doesn’t do special pleading. For his
part, Jan ignores his father’s correspondence.
After this triple whammy, the film loses our attention somewhat
as it relocates to Greenland, where Jan and his family settle in. Jan
ingratiates himself with a young woman, Karine (Berda Larsen) in a bar, where
Jan, who speaks the local language with some care, is described as a ‘kalak’ or
‘dirty Greenlander’. Jan chooses to accept the term as a compliment, a mark
that he has been accepted by the community. This is delusional. The community
doesn’t ‘like’ him, rather watch him with some fascination. What will he do?
How far will he go? When will he quit?
Eklöf portrays Jan’s intimacy with Karine in a restrained
manner. She doesn’t objectify Greenland women, shown as simultaneously present
and remote. Jan is on call 24/7. He doesn’t complain when he has to deliver a
baby. He appears to share the mother’s joy but doesn’t impose himself.
Nevertheless, he is direct about his desire and, in confessing his infidelity,
is cruel to his wife. In his way, he is as unapologetic as his father. He
doesn’t pretend that he is leaving his family for an Inuit way of life, or even
plans on taking Karine to Copenhagen. Rather, he enjoys what he has at one
moment in time. He is selfish.
That said, he is attentive to his children and dissuades
them from wanting to own a dog. ‘These are working dogs,’ Jan explains when his
daughter learns of an available litter. The inference is that they cannot be
domesticated. Jan’s son, Markus (Bertram Krassel) regards his father with
suspicion. There is a moment when the family has a group hug; Markus refuses to
join.
When Jan confesses his trauma to Karine, she is unimpressed.
‘I was raped,’ she explains. ‘My child is the result of rape.’ Insulted by him,
Karine visits his home and scratches his face. Eklöf depicts a very particular,
insistent type of knocking on the door, even when the door is open.
Greenlanders don’t enter a house unless invited. Jan himself doesn’t follow
this rule. He visits one man’s house, with a police officer in tow, to
administer an injection. The man lies still on a sofa. The scene very clearly
evokes the film’s opening; the set up is actually repeated one more time in the
film’s climax, when Jan brings his father breakfast (coffee, juice and a
sandwich). The man lies still. Jan prepares the syringe and is about to inject
him when the man leaps up, runs to the kitchen and grabs a carving knife. ‘You
were about to stab me,’ the man complains. ‘No,’ Jan attempts to reassure him.
The police officer happily intervenes, though it isn’t clear whether the
injection is given. The point is that not everyone wants medical treatment. Jan
has to be fearless.
After his face is scratched and graffiti appears outside the
apartment – ‘go home Danish Nazis’ – Jan takes another assignment. While she
broadly follows the arc of Leine’s autobiography, Eklöf, working with Leine and
co-screenwriter Sissel Dalsgaard Thomsen, changes some details. Jan settles
into another community but his desire for local women is unabated, befriending
a young mother, Nikoline (Vigga Tukula), creating a dependency that he cannot
honour that ends in fire.
Before then, while Jan’s family enjoys a meal with some
locals, Jan’s daughter steps out to see their dogs. The result is a violent
attack. She was lucky that the dog did not tear at her throat, Jan is told by a
kindly surgeon, Søren (Anders Mossling). After the family, minus Jan, is
repatriated to Denmark, Søren gives Jan instructions on how to live and work;
how drugs can keep you awake and, when necessarily, send you to sleep. ‘This
hospital is one big drug dealer,’ Søren says warmly, as if nurtured by his
profession. There is no doubt that Jan admires Søren, even as he descends into
addiction hell in the aftermath of refusing Nikoline.
In the final part of the movie, Jan helps himself to stock,
ostensibly, we conclude, to kill himself. He is alone and wracked with guilt. Having
noticed Jan’s frequent recourse to the medical cabinet, a nurse turns him down.
‘It took ages for me to find a husband,’ she tells Jan. ‘He rejected me, but I
persisted. Now life is good.’ She focuses on Jan. ‘What can you offer me?’ Jan,
emotionally honest if also an asshole, cannot answer. He needs that speech to
wake him up, even if it doesn’t achieve that effect.
‘I didn’t expect to
live until I was seventy,’ Jan’s father tells him. ‘Now I’m seventy-five.’ Jan
remembers how Søren told him how to mix vodka and coffee. ‘Place a coin in the
cup, fill it a third of the way with coffee so you can’t see the coin. Then
pour vodka until the coin is visible.’ It is one of the film’s lighter moments.
It is hard to imagine that the finale of the film is based
in fact, otherwise Leine would have a different sort of notoriety. It is a form
of wish fulfilment. In a sense, Jan understands very well the need of his
patient, bullish as Jan’s father might be about his treatment of others; he
used another victim’s name as a computer password. ‘Now more than ever, I love
life,’ Jan’s father explains with unrestrained ripeness. Jan confronts him
about the past. He also stays to the end.
By fictionalizing the outcome of his story, Leine draws
attention to the artificiality of closure. You don’t treat trauma, you manage
it, understanding your own vulnerabilities and adjusting your behaviour. You
don’t fully hide it either. Kalak isn’t a satisfying movie, but
it shines a light in places that you might not want to consider, either by
choice or ignorance. It is a difficult second movie, but difficult in the right
way, sometimes slow to get to the point and repetitive. But when it is strong,
it is to quote one of the characters in Avatar: The Way of Water
mighty. To put it another way, its like black coffee without the vodka. You
can’t see the coin.
Reviewed at München International Film Festival, Arri
Film Lounge (Clubkino), Türkenstrasse 91, Munich, Thursday 4 July 2024, 18:00
screening
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