23/08/2010

Johan Kling, who made his breakthrough in 2007 with Darling [+see also:
trailer
film profile], has again chosen Stockholm and a jazzy score to set the mood for his new film, Trust Me [+see also:
trailer
film profile], released last Friday on 38 Swedish screens by Nordisk Film.

Kling took inspiration from Ingmar Bergman’s Smiles from a Summer Night for this cynical social farce of partner swapping, set over just a few days in an amateur theatre, although theatre itself is never central to the plot. Director Katja (impressive newcomer Susanne Thorson) is struggling to get her group of actors to show up at rehearsals and is stressed by a landlord (Michael Segerström) who wants the financially unsound theatre troupe out of his building.

A dozen characters come and go around Katja, bringing to the forefront their own little lies, weaknesses and misdeeds. Including her handsome boyfriend (Alexander Skarsgård) who’s cheating on her with an actress (Philomene Grandin); the sexually repressed technician (Stellan Skarsgård) who buys a graphically explicit books that land in the wrong hands; and kleptomaniac actress Michy (Michelle Meadows).

The storyline is written conventionally, with the interwoven details and recurrent elements pushing the plot forward until the final twist. Unlike his feature debut, an engrossing study of an encounter between two opposite people, Trust Me is a light gallery of portraits, but Kling’s distinctive sophisticated filmmaking style establishes him as one of Sweden’s new directors to watch.

Trust Me was produced by St Paul Film in co-production with Norway’s 4½ Production. World sales are handled by TrustNordisk.