Prague

Colour, 35 mm
Denmark, 2006, 92 min
Section: Variety Critics’ Choice

Synopsis

Marriage on the rocks has long been on the menu at cinema’s vast bar, but few recent helmers have managed to mix as potent a brew as Ole Christian Madsen in the long dramatic draught that is Prague. The story of a Copenhagen marriage that slowly crumbles during a sad, darkly quirky trip to the Czech capital, this widescreen wedge of underplayed Danish discord is far more resonant and focused than Madsen’s previous export, Kira’s Reason: A Love Story. Focusing in large part on faces, and fragments of faces, in the drama, Madsen uses the rigid countenance of Mads Mikkelsen and the troubled beauty of Stine Stengade – both outstanding – as windows to their turbulent souls. This perfectly calibrated balance of chamber drama with the persistent wisp of dark humor renders the pic a throwback to Euro artfare of yore.