Love (Drama)
Director: Dag Johan Haugerud
Producer: Yngve Sæther,Hege Hauff Hvattum
Screenwriter: Dag Johan Haugerud
Cinematographer: Cecilie Semec
Key Cast: Andrea Bræin Hovig,Tayo Cittadella Jacobsen,Marte Engebrigtsen
While travelling by ferry – a popular cruising destination in more ways than one – a commitment-shy doctor has a life-changing brush with contemporary hook-up culture.
Marianne (Andrea Bræin Hovig, in a Gothenburg Film Festival award-winning performance) is a urologist at an Oslo hospital, tasked with delivering prostate cancer diagnoses to male patients. Reluctant to seek out any serious relationships, she lets her friend fix her up with a date on the nearby peninsula of Nesodden, just a short ferry ride away. When she meets work colleague Tor en route and he confides that he uses the cruise as a hotspot for Grindr hook-ups, Marianne begins to wonder if a random sexual encounter of her own might be a way to bring some frisson to her life, and to distract from the spectre of death that looms over her day job. But as she and Tor each discover, nothing is ever simple in the realm of sexual intimacy.
Premiering in Competition at Venice, the second part of Dag Johan Haugerud’s Sex/Dreams/Love trilogy is an exploration of the differing expectations that are imposed on people of varied sexual orientations, and that individuals place upon themselves. Allowing its themes to unfold via meticulous character development – a skill Haugerud has honed over his parallel career as a novelist – Love expertly interrogates the centrality of sex to the human experience.
“A charming and intelligent Norwegian dramedy [that will] win over hearts and minds … a refreshing delight.” – The Hollywood Reporter