Who Talks

CinemaSerf

At it’s heart, this has points to make about local democracy, consultation and perhaps even some culturally motivated tensions too. Sadly though, the execution is all too messy to really work. We start with a scenario that’s obviously meant to introduce us to teacher “Niklas” (Kristoffer Appelquist) but that is undercooked, then we meet “Karin” (Cecilia Milocco) who is having some sort of difficulty with her teenage son but again, we know no more before being taken to a town meeting where she must address the disgruntled local residents who are concerned about plans to place immigrant children, mostly boys, into their community. Are they a threat? Are they deserters? Will it be safe for the women? How much will it cost? Why was nobody consulted? After all they’re just kids? Oddly enough, all questions that you might expect to be asked, if not answered. Some suggest they might have an open mind, others anything but, but as the noise levels rise and “Niklas” struggles to get his question in about school resources it becomes clear that “Karin” has other things on her mind and then, well a chair is accidentally knocked over and there we sort of fizzle out leaving us none the wiser about just about everything on the smorgasbord of questions we arrived with. No characterisation, lots of argumentative dialogue and me wondering what I missed. Maybe nobody was listening rather than talking?