Baltasar Kormakur's White Night Wedding offers a compelling glimpse into the pursuit of dreams and happiness through the story of a couple's simultaneously tragic and humorous wedding night. By weaving together stories from different times and perspectives, Kormakur shows the full range of human emotion, from terrible despair and loss to finding new love and dreams for the future. With its expert balance of mainstream film conventions with the realistic and at times blunt nature of Nordic film, the film was generally met with success. It received 7 Edda awards and was also Icland's entry for the foreign-language Oscar in 2009.
The plot revolves around Jon, a 40-some philosophy professor, on the eve of his second wedding. The first scene portrays Jon as apathetic and uninterested in his young bride Thora, as the film progresses his behavior is slowly justified as we learn about the tragic events of his past marriage that haunt him. The film blurs past and present as the scenes alternate between the comedic escapades of the groom's best friend's drunken late-night activities, Jon's conflict with Sisi (Thora's mother), and flashbacks of Jon's struggles with his late wife, Anna.
One of the film's most intriguing aspects stems from the delicate way that Kormakur stretches and obscures the passage of time. The "White Night" of the film's title refers to the day of the year when the dark of night is shortest. This creates a strange visual experience for the viewer: although the primary events of the film occur over the course of night, the constant presence of the hazy Icelandic sun obscures our reference point for the passage of time. Because of the importance of the impending wedding the next day, the viewer feels a heightened sense of discomfort upon this temporal confusion. Additionally, Jon's flashbacks further disrupt our sense of time. The transitions between past and present are subtle, and with significant overlaps in setting and characters, the viewer is not always aware in what time or space the events on the screen are taking place. Overall, this temporal obscurity enhances our understanding of the pervasive emotional turmoil to which Jon, Anna, Thora, Sisi, and many of the other characters are subject.
Obfuscating our sense of time in the film is just one of many ways that Kormakur evokes a strong emotional response from the viewer. There is significant contrast between the emotions of the past and present events portrayed in the film. The humorous exploits of Jon and his friends as they gallivant drunkenly through the town are strongly juxtaposed with vignettes of Jon's past life. We acutely experience Anna's severe depression, the priest's anger and frustration, and Sisi's domineering abuse alongside comedic dreams of a golf course gone awry, the passion of new love, and whimsical mountaintop serenades. Through this juxtaposition, we experience each set of emotions all the more profoundly. The breathtaking setting of the island of Flatey perpetuates these emotions well: a rather garish lighting of the bright island hills somehow fits the essence of both the raw unhappiness of the past and the inescapable imminence of the immediate future. The high contrast between land, sea, and sky captures the high contrast of the character's emotions and our responses to those emotions.
The wide variety of characters in the narrative allows us to experience the full range of human emotions, and is a source of great entertainment and poignancy in the film. Through mere glimpses into the lives of these characters, the audience feels a deep sense of compassion and understanding of each of their walks of life. One of the film's most lovable characters is Lasus, Thora's father. Though dejected by his domineering wife, Lasus find solace in music and entertaining Flatey's visitors. However, Lasus' jovial spirits are bittersweet: he has left behind his dream of becoming an opera singer. A shot of his plump, naked body bobbing alone in the sea as he sings a lonesome folk tune profoundly captures the essence of this emotionally duality. Another highlight of the island's residences is Malla, Thora's delightfully contrary sister. Though Malla is a social misfit and is constantly chastised by Sisi, she too finds a form of love and learns to have the gumption to triumph over Sisi's bullying. This ramshackle bunch of eccentric characters allows us to experience the entire spectrum of human emotion that is so critical in the film. Their wants, desires, and dreams fulfilled and unfulfilled tell a tale of life's many journeys, good and bad. Like the sun's perpetual trek across the sky, we are at times unable to change the course of events that befall us. Love and life is at times lost. However, life is not lived with the arrival or disappearance of night and day, but rather in the spaces in between: in the white night, in the perpetual and unavoidable journey that life itself entails. Overall, White Night Wedding offers a painfully honest tale that wonderfully captures the countless complexities of the human journey.
The plot revolves around Jon, a 40-some philosophy professor, on the eve of his second wedding. The first scene portrays Jon as apathetic and uninterested in his young bride Thora, as the film progresses his behavior is slowly justified as we learn about the tragic events of his past marriage that haunt him. The film blurs past and present as the scenes alternate between the comedic escapades of the groom's best friend's drunken late-night activities, Jon's conflict with Sisi (Thora's mother), and flashbacks of Jon's struggles with his late wife, Anna.
One of the film's most intriguing aspects stems from the delicate way that Kormakur stretches and obscures the passage of time. The "White Night" of the film's title refers to the day of the year when the dark of night is shortest. This creates a strange visual experience for the viewer: although the primary events of the film occur over the course of night, the constant presence of the hazy Icelandic sun obscures our reference point for the passage of time. Because of the importance of the impending wedding the next day, the viewer feels a heightened sense of discomfort upon this temporal confusion. Additionally, Jon's flashbacks further disrupt our sense of time. The transitions between past and present are subtle, and with significant overlaps in setting and characters, the viewer is not always aware in what time or space the events on the screen are taking place. Overall, this temporal obscurity enhances our understanding of the pervasive emotional turmoil to which Jon, Anna, Thora, Sisi, and many of the other characters are subject.
Obfuscating our sense of time in the film is just one of many ways that Kormakur evokes a strong emotional response from the viewer. There is significant contrast between the emotions of the past and present events portrayed in the film. The humorous exploits of Jon and his friends as they gallivant drunkenly through the town are strongly juxtaposed with vignettes of Jon's past life. We acutely experience Anna's severe depression, the priest's anger and frustration, and Sisi's domineering abuse alongside comedic dreams of a golf course gone awry, the passion of new love, and whimsical mountaintop serenades. Through this juxtaposition, we experience each set of emotions all the more profoundly. The breathtaking setting of the island of Flatey perpetuates these emotions well: a rather garish lighting of the bright island hills somehow fits the essence of both the raw unhappiness of the past and the inescapable imminence of the immediate future. The high contrast between land, sea, and sky captures the high contrast of the character's emotions and our responses to those emotions.
The wide variety of characters in the narrative allows us to experience the full range of human emotions, and is a source of great entertainment and poignancy in the film. Through mere glimpses into the lives of these characters, the audience feels a deep sense of compassion and understanding of each of their walks of life. One of the film's most lovable characters is Lasus, Thora's father. Though dejected by his domineering wife, Lasus find solace in music and entertaining Flatey's visitors. However, Lasus' jovial spirits are bittersweet: he has left behind his dream of becoming an opera singer. A shot of his plump, naked body bobbing alone in the sea as he sings a lonesome folk tune profoundly captures the essence of this emotionally duality. Another highlight of the island's residences is Malla, Thora's delightfully contrary sister. Though Malla is a social misfit and is constantly chastised by Sisi, she too finds a form of love and learns to have the gumption to triumph over Sisi's bullying. This ramshackle bunch of eccentric characters allows us to experience the entire spectrum of human emotion that is so critical in the film. Their wants, desires, and dreams fulfilled and unfulfilled tell a tale of life's many journeys, good and bad. Like the sun's perpetual trek across the sky, we are at times unable to change the course of events that befall us. Love and life is at times lost. However, life is not lived with the arrival or disappearance of night and day, but rather in the spaces in between: in the white night, in the perpetual and unavoidable journey that life itself entails. Overall, White Night Wedding offers a painfully honest tale that wonderfully captures the countless complexities of the human journey.