Brothers Is A Film That Uses A "What If?" Question For All The People That Go Off To War "What If You Went Off To War And You Were Presumed Dead And Your Brother Took Over From You Looking After Everyone?" And Thet Leads Further Questions Like "Would He Stop There?" Or "Would Your Kids Play Favourites And Leave You Out In The Cold?" All Of Which Can Be Answered In This Film.I Have Pretty Much Explained The Plot As The What If Question. The Best Performance Is From Ulrich Thomsen, True He Played The Character I Liked The Most(I REALLY Felt Sorry For Him) And He Did Such A Great Performance I Had To Convince Myself He Didn't Live Through All That(At Least I Hope Not).Nikolaj Lie Kaas Is Someone Else I Have To Put In A Good Word For Too, At First His Character Seemed Like An Asshole To Me But He Changed To Be Rather Likable, Thats Good Writing For You.There Is An American Remake Of This But I Wont Bother, It Looks Like Its Shot For Shot.Overall I Thought This Film Is One Of The Best Dramas I Have Seen In A While.

In 2001 the invasion in Afghanistan and especially the ensuing occupation took me by surprise. For in the eighties the Mujahideen had been glorified as the brave freedom fighters, who defended the sovereignty of their nation. President Reagan stressed their rights to live according to their religious beliefs and (backward) traditions. Since 2005, when the international occupation was extended to the hostile south, I was fascinated and indignant at our presence, in particular since the Dutch forces played a (relatively) appreciable role. Seventy years ago the Netherlands itself were occupied by the Nazi regime, without reason. What would this role reversal do to the minds of our soldiers? Although war films are not my primary focus, the Danish film "Brodre" interested me. For it elaborates on the theme of occupation, and Denmark is in many respects the sister nation of the Netherlands. The film tells the story of a Danish officer, who snaps morally during his mission in Afghanistan, and commits a murder. He returns to his family as a mental wreck. The mental problems of veteran soldiers after a military campaign in alien regions are well known since the Vietnam war, and add to the enormous costs of such operations. The narration in Brodre is credible and succeeds in upholding the suspense. We witness the incomprehension of the colleagues and the family with regard to the traumatized behavior of the returned soldier. Nevertheless I am not certain if I have truly grasped the message of the film, in particular the relation between the two brothers. Morally they switch sides: whereas officer Michael commits an atrocious crime, his brother Jannik puts an end to his past as a robber. Obviously the whole family balances on the verge of social dysfunctionality. The father of the two brothers is rude and for instance disposed to drunk driving. The wife of Michael is not the very picture of the faithful spouse. And his children are disobedient, and one of them even gossips without justice about a supposed affair between Jannik and her mother. In the beginning Michael seems to be the solid corner stone of this fragile family. The spectator does not expect that this man of all people is capable of committing a horrible murder. One is inclined to attribute the derailment to the particular borderline nature of his social environment. Still on reflection the story has a more general validity, since military personnel often originates from morally floating communities (few strong personalities will be willing to risk their lives in dubious expeditions). It is interesting that exactly the same theme was addressed in the Dutch film "Stella's oorlog", and therefore a comparison seems obvious. For me the comparison results in a draw. Brodre is more thrilling, whereas Stella's oorlog has the more credible story. In Stella's oorlog the traumas result from a derailed behavior during combat, and friendly fire. The atmosphere in these North-European films is strikingly different from American counterparts like "The deer hunter" or "Apocalypse now", that depict heroism, targeted aggression and inflexibility. If you are interested in the facts, you might consider seeing the documentary "Rethink Afghanistan".

And the consequences of that scene make the end so sad: I do not think that the person played by Connie Nielsen, who demands that 'If you don't tell me, you'll never see me again,' will be able to understand the situation depicted in that ugly scene in Afghanistan. Nor should the man who has created himself the defence 'Do you realise what I did to be with you?' be completely understood. But he will need years to overcome the self-defence, if he ever will. (Perhaps the warning example of his unpleasant hard-line dad will prevent him from becoming as despicable as his father.) A thought-provoking film by the writers Susanne Bier and Anders Thomas Jensen and director Bier.

Rarely a film comes along that resonates not only due to its aesthetic quality, but also metaphorically on the level of personal experience. Brothers is such a film. When I saw it, I was blown away.Michael (Ulrich Thompson) is the older and more stable brother of Jannik, played by the by now Danish Superstar Nikolaj Lie Kass, who must first bail his brother out of jail, then report to duty as a soldier in Afghanistan. The helicopter of his platoon is quickly shot down, and Michael finds himself held as a prisoner by an Afghan warlord with one other of his soldiers.Meanwhile, Michael's absence seems to have a good effect on Jannik, who befriends his family and children, and by all observances begins to turn his life around. In an interesting scene, the Afghan leader who has gotten a hold of a shoulder rocket but doesn't know how to use it, asks how assemble it. He confronts the other soldier who doesn't have the know-how how to arm it. When he starts to scream and it looks like he is going to kill them both, Michael Calmly steps in and shows all the steps necessary for engagement of the missile. Now everyone knows that this rocket will now be used to kill as many as a dozen more soldiers, but this is a choice that a person, Michael, has made under pressure that peaked my interest and almost sent chills down my spine. This is a person who loves his family so much and wants to live so badly to see them again, so much so, that he doesn't care for the moment that others will die, he just wants to live.The Afghani quietly notices Michael's will to survive, and soon thereafter off-handedly orders him to kill his comrade. By hand. Michael refuses, then when threatened summons up his will, and yes courage, and beats his comrade to death. It was like a 5.7 tremor shook when this happened. He wants to live so much, and feels he has so much to live for, that he is willing to do anything.Back home, Jannik and Michael's wife, Sarah (played by attractive Connie Nielsen), get news of Michael's death. Since Jannik has become one of the family and spends much time with them, opportunities arise for infidelity, served up with savory dramatic irony for the audience in the pitch-black theater. A raid on the Afghan camp ensues, and in moments Michael is free. And this is the beauty and power of the picture; after his release he is free in the physical sense but is in a spiritual choke hold from his previous action for the rest of the film. This is where the movie begins to take off. It is as if everything else was a primer for the real conflict. I do not think a screenwriter usually thinks about escalating conflict in this way. The entire film, as one reviewer notes, is "a marvel of screen writing." The way in which conflict in this film segues from one level to another is genuinely inspiring; from family, to the politics of war, to the home.This is exactly what low budget films should aim to do. In a production aspect, they should be sure to please a small group of the audience, this I imagine being the European Union in this scenario, and in a story aspect they should resonate with meaning and life. The Dogma 95 style of films also seem to help accentuate and streamline the message.This is a kind of movie which hardly anyone goes to see grosses $300,000 in the U.S., and then fifteen years later, someone comes along, feels it's power, and remakes it in English. They would perhaps draw out everything, and add money to the production budget, and maybe make a small fortune. One critic has said that this was the "Deer hunter for the war on Terror." From what I cam remember, I personally think it is a stronger film.There really isn't much one can do, in my opinion, to make Brothers a better film. In fact, I can not think of a single thing, which makes me look naturally elsewhere for reasons for its narrow box office appeal, in America at least. It is true then what I have been reading about Americans' aversion to reading subtitles, heck, to reading anything for that matter, other than the Star and the Enquirer. God Bless Oprah, and Oprah's book club. Sometimes you have to be big to be noticed, and maybe, just maybe, if this film was in English, with a higher production budget, it would be up for an Academy Award. But most probably, it would be made with much less skill and sensitivity than the original, as we have seen countless times with other foreign films such as Ringu, and Insomia, I am told.