The New York TimesMovie ReviewEvil (2003)Challenging the Damage That Boys DoBy STEPHEN HOLDEN
Published: March 10, 2006 Ruthless teenage pecking orders, be they street gangs or snooty alpha girls and their retinues, seem to be hard-wired into society. Each of these expressions of the primal human need to create hierarchies comes equipped with its own elaborate rites of passage. But as countless stories of fraternity hazings gone awry have demonstrated, the boundary separating playful humiliation from life-threatening sadism can be awfully thin. Is such ritualized behavior really unavoidable?
"Evil," a well-made Swedish film directed by Mikael Hafstrom and set at an elite boys' secondary school in the mid-1950's, illustrates how cruelties exacted in the name of initiation are perpetuated year after year in a closed system of tit-for-tat violence. The movie is as blunt as its title. It portrays such behavior as "evil" without offering any deep insights or revelations, beyond handing out the plot equivalent of a lollipop at the end of the movie as compensation for the vicarious anguish.
At the Stjarnsberg Boarding School, the seniors who run the student council relish punishing the incoming freshmen for the tiniest infractions of their arbitrary rules. The worst punishment in a graduated system of house arrests and detentions is a summons to "the ring," where two seniors beat up an underclassman, then make him crawl and beg for mercy. For the top dogs, it's payback time for the pain they endured when they were younger.
What happens when a student breaks the code of blind obedience and stands up to the leaders? In "Evil," Erik Ponti (Andreas Wilson), an aggressive newcomer and champion swimmer, learns the consequences of defiance the hard way.
Video: Movie Minutes Stephen Holden reviews "Evil," a Swedish film directed by Mikael Hafstrom and set at an elite boys' secondary school in the mid-1950's.
Because it initially portrays Erik as a monster, expelled from his public school for leading a gang that terrorizes another boy and beats him to a pulp, the movie surprises by doing a complete turnaround and making him an adolescent rebel hero. It also makes much of the fact that Erik, who comes from a working-class background, finds himself surrounded at his new school by willowy, sneering aristocrats who flaunt their pedigrees and wealth as badges of their superiority.
Stjarnsberg is Snob Central, run by a disingenuous headmaster who turns a blind eye to abuses he might have experienced himself as a youth. The movie invites you to hate the school and everyone in it except for the swimming coach, who encourages Erik to rebel, and Erik's quiet, nerdy roommate and best friend, Pierre (Henrik Lundstrom), who becomes the focus of abuse when Erik refuses to bow down. Erik also violates the rules by secretly hooking up with Marja (Linda Zilliacus), a Finnish girl who works in the dining hall.
The story comes wrapped in tidy psychological explanations. Erik comes from a family as paternalistically oppressed as any portrayed by Ingmar Bergman: his stepfather (Johan Rabaeus) is a tyrant who regularly orders Erik to visit him for "a talk" in the other room after dinner, then beats him with a switch while his terrorized mother cowers in the next room, playing the piano to drown out the sounds.
And so evil at home begets evil at Erik's first school, from which he is expelled after being denounced as pure evil. And pure evil, in the person of the head upperclassman, Otto Silverhielm (Gustaf Skarsgard), is what Erik faces in a showdown that efficiently pushes the usual buttons.
EvilOpens today in New York and Los Angeles.
Directed by Mikael Hafstrom; written (in Swedish, with English subtitles) by Mr. Hafstrom and Hans Gunnarsson, based on the novel by Jan Guillou; director of photography, Peter Mokrosinski; edited by Darek Hodor; music by Francis Shaw; production designer, Anna Asp; produced by Hans Lonnerheden and Ingemar Leijonborg; released by Magnolia Pictures. Running time: 113 minutes. This film is not rated.
WITH: Andreas Wilson (Erik Ponti), Henrik Lundstrom (Pierre Tanguy), Gustaf Skarsgard (Otto Silverhielm), Linda Zilliacus (Marja), Jesper Salen (Dalen), Filip Berg (Johan) and Johan Rabaeus (the father).[/list]
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Comment left for this review:
review of "Evil," a film from SwedenThe is an outstanding film. I believe it has more depth than Times Review gives it credit. Wonderful photography and appropriate orchestral backing. A real cinematic experience, not an independent low budget movie. Hard to take at times, but true to life. Highly recommended.
– Joseph T. Masaryk, Mesa, Arizona[/list][/list]