02/02/2023 - Andreas Öhman’s film is a finely tuned take on the lighter and darker sides of family dynamics, enhanced by solid acting by both live and animated performers

Homecoming is the central theme of this year’s Focus section at the Göteborg Film Festival, offering a total of 11 interpretations “on the feelings of home in the contemporary world”. In Andreas Öhman’s One Day All This Will Be Yours [+see also:
trailer
interview: Andreas Öhman
film profile], and to its protagonist, Lisa, home is embodied by the down-to-earth, rural Swedish north she has emigrated from for the bohemian hustle and bustle of Stockholm – two equally substantial national locations, coexisting more or less in harmony.

Öhman, who gained instant attention with his Oscar-shortlisted debut feature, Simple Simon [+see also:
trailer
film profile], in 2010, has found a niche in his colourful depictions of offbeat personalities, merging traits from the US independent tradition with a heartfelt Scandinavian sentiment. The occasional enhancement via animated characters interacting with the live ones (at least in their heads) places him even further into his own territory. A succulent sample of this craft is served up already in the opening shot, as a foamy busybody turns up in Lisa’s bathtub, providing unsolicited opinions. An in-vogue “alternative” cartoonist with a successful comic strip, she is currently working to a deadline for a book edition of original work, with some struggles to achieve said originality – much to the frustration of her editor/ex-boyfriend (and to the cheeky delight of “Mr Foamy”). To add additional unrest, Lisa’s parents have called on all of their children to be present for an important announcement of an unspecified nature to be delivered back home, way up north. With weary head and heavy heart (and with that darned deadline still looming), Lisa sets off to face the news, the family and, not least, herself. For like in so many of these homecoming tales, some unresolved matters are lurking in the woods.

The announcement concerns the sawmill that Lisa’s father built with his own hands and wants to hand over to his offspring, consisting of Lisa and her older sister Josefine and brother Håkan, a somewhat discordant league of personalities, none overly keen regarding the offer – or even to socialise very much, really. It soon becomes clear that the family carry a shared traumatic experience of a lost fourth sibling, especially taxing in Lisa’s case, as she was present at the time of the loss. In the main role, Karin Franz Körlof could well be this year’s “worst person in the world” and may want to save the date for the 2024 Guldbagge Awards. Other acting performances are solid all around in this finely and lovingly tuned take on the ever-prevalent family story of occasionally dysfunctional but fundamentally deeply affectionate dynamics, with Öhman’s screenplay navigating quite seamlessly between light and darker notes – and at times downright silly ones. A crayfish performing a chirpy cancer ditty in faux Danish certainly takes that particular biscuit.

One Day All This Will Be Yours was produced by Grand Slam Film Production (Sweden).