Love Is All You Need

I would expect Susanne Bier to portray the relationships better than she actually did. Also because I gave five-star ratings to all three movies of hers I watched before this one. But it simply wasn’t possible here. Although the Mediterranean locations were nice enough, and would lift anyone’s mood, even if they were imprisoned in North Siberian gulag, on the other hand, the tangled relationships were dealt with in way too much detail. Pierce Brosnan keeps on hesitating, and this hesitation almost costs him Paprika Steen’s love. Anyhow, it must be said that this movie has a certain comedic charm. The two hours passed by quite pleasantly. One would, however, expect something more from Susanne Bier and Anders Thomas Jensen. But I understand that it is impossible to only live in gloom and dark humor, and I accept this as a certain personal detox for the creators. (12/02/2015)

If one’s favorite creator has to disappoint, then he must do so gigantically. That is exactly what Susanne and her court screenwriter (and subjectively for me, one of the most interesting people in Danish cinema), Anders Thomas Jensen, succeeded in doing. A very sour lemon, more acidic than diluted American straws, which do not have to disguise their detachment, fairy-tale aspects and simplicity for 100 minutes as suspicious trips to realism and unexpected openness. All You Need Is Love definitely contains a few moments in which Jensen's cynicism and fondness for genre antithesis is not denied, but when I find out in the end that all these carcinogenic, family-disillusioning and sexually bent moments serve as the cheapest solution to ridiculed romantic sentiment, I get sick to my stomach. This is because Bier is not Trier and can't manipulate the viewer as expertly - the dialogues are annoyingly tedious and tangled, the "realistic" hand-filmed scene looks like a fist to the eye between romantic postcards from Italy, and the characters are showily “turned-out" in order to fill their diverse grotesque roles. I understand that for abandoned mothers and sentimental addicts, the combination of a raffish hairdresser crayfish - a squashed ex-Bond will function as an emotional aphrodisiac, but I felt very sick after this bucket of pink lemonade. This is also because this is not just a "clumsy attempt" to make a genre film, but rather completely targeted blackmail - and the directing is terrible. Shave the Dogma 95 certificate off Susanne Bier and send Jensen to comb Adam's apples for five years. Then he will forget about the citruses. (13/11/2012)

A good romantic film, but overall, it leans more towards average than anything exceptional. It's because while interesting topics are touched upon, they're not ultimately explored in depth or made particularly impactful. It feels more like an attempt to spice up romance without the seasoning actually making sense. For example, the homosexual relationship or the consequences of cancer seem to be added to the plot somewhat unnecessarily, although they are naturally depicted. (05/11/2016)