Recensione: The Swedish Torpedo
di Jan Lumholdt
- Frida Kempff realizza un affettuoso biopic sulla vita acquatica di Sally Bauer, che ha nuotato per uscire dalle ristrettezze degli anni Trenta
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Already in her Cannes-awarded 2010 short Bathing Mickey, director Frida Kempff (Knocking [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Frida Kempff
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intervista: Frida Kempff
scheda film] is exactly that.
The “torpedo” moniker is highly appropriate when it comes to Sally Bauer (1908-2001), the Swedish swimming sensation who took on a number of long-distance challenges, usually succeeding with flying colours. With no Olympic medal or world championship title to her name – a world war getting in the way of things could have played a significant part – she’s gradually been confined to relative obscurity, even nationally. In her time, though, she was a big kahuna, and her 1939 English Channel crossing (as the fourth woman ever to do so; she also repeated the feat in 1951) almost made her a female Charles Lindbergh of the waters, at least nationally. There’s a school and a train named after her, a novel and a play written about her, and now, a feature film focusing on her.
Basing their narrative on a mix between authentic and fictional events and characters, Kempff and co-writer Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten (Beyond [+leggi anche:
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scheda film], Call Girl [+leggi anche:
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In Josefin Neldén (The Restaurant, Border [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Ali Abbasi
scheda film]), Kempff has found just the right and versatile person to play Bauer, portraying the loving, if hardly ideal, mother, the girlish paramour of her son’s two-timing, already-married father (a boyish Mikkel Boe Følsgaard), and the downright steampunk aquatic daredevil, smeared in muddy oil, with sturdy, oversized goggles in place – an emancipated 1930s female who truly perfected her special chops in life. Lisa Carlehed gives admirable support as Sally’s hard-pressed but ultimately devoted sister-in-arms, and newcomer Arthur Sörbring is quite wonderful as little Lars, torn between at most 49% anger at his mother’s neglect, and at least 51% pride and excitement in her glorious adventure. Hannes Krantz from Crazy Pictures provides first-rate camera work throughout, including, needless to say, some pretty awesome water moments, above as well as below the surface.
The Swedish Torpedo is a Swedish-Estonian-Finnish-Belgian co-production staged by Momento Film, and co-produced by Amrion, Velvet Films, Inland Film Company, Film i Väst, TV4, SVT, RTBF and Proximus. Its world sales are handled by Urban Sales.
(Tradotto dall'inglese)
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