MartinHafer "Open Hearts" is a film I decided to see simply because Mads Mikkelsen starred in the movie. He's done some incredibly impressive films-- including three films nominated for the Best Foreign Language Oscar! However, the movie itself is the sort of thing I usually wouldn't watch, as it's about adultery and I am a VERY traditional man and was afraid the film might glamorize the affair. Fortunately, it did not and the film is well worth seeing.The film has a difficult to believe plot. However, because it is well directed and acted, it works. It begins with a young couple becoming engaged and looking forward to a married life. However, one day the man gets out of his car and is struck by another car. The guy is nearly killed and ends up being a quadriplegic! Now here's the odd part. The driver's husband (Mikkelsen) works at the hospital and over time he and the fiancée (Sonja Richter) become intimate. Soon they are having an affair and he is having a hard time keeping it secret. What's next? See the film. This film is supposedly from a director from the Dogma 95 movement-- Susanne Bier. However, the film does not completely conform to the unusual and rigid 'manifesto' that Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg created as the Bible, so to speak, of these style films. While it's very much like a Dogma 95 film in some ways (its extensive use of the hand-held camera, the use of natural settings and not sets as well as that the story is about normal folks in the present), it's also quite unlike a Dogma film (such as using grainy black & white footage during one small portion, the use of fake blood and some of the music is not naturally occurring background music). My attitude is who cares?! As long as the film is well made and engaging, that's what is important. While this isn't as good as the Bier/Mikkelsen collaboration "After the Wedding", it is a superior film. It's just too bad that there is some nudity throughout the film because I actually think it's a great film for teens to see as the object lesson I took from it is that there are consequences for an affair--good and definitely bad.

ikanboy I have become a fan of Bier's work. "After the wedding" and "Brothers" were engrossing "relationship" movies fraught with emotion, crackling dialog and unpredictable twists. This one starts with a shock. A man who has just proposed to his lover is run over by a car and paralyzed for life. We've been here before. The question is where does Bier take it? True to her fashion she takes it off on a tangent that essentially sidelines the initial plot line.Cecilli, the female lover is rejected by her paralyzed fiancée, who implodes into self hate and loss and takes it out on the people who try to take care of him. This is of course not uncommon, especially for males. Hating their dependency and helplessness they attack those who inadvertently rub this helplessness in, simply by being caretakers. Cecillia finds solace with a Doctor in the hospital, but in this case he's the husband of the woman who ran down her lover! This is where the movie goes off into another area, and while that area is fascinating and difficult to watch - adultery, bad ethics, stupidity, and moral cowardice - it leaves completely behind one vital part of the movie and that is the emotional state of the wife who caused the accident! Bier chooses to focus instead on the triangle of the Doctor: Niels (played by Mads Mikkelsen from after the wedding) Cecillia, and the Doctor's daughter who was in the car driven by her mother and feels she is the cause of the crash, because she was arguing with her mother. The daughter, Stine, seems to read her father better than the wife, and is on to his infidelity from the start while the wife allows herself to be talked out of it by a mendacious Niels. If Bier is trying to show us that the wife is shunted aside because she is out of touch emotionally it isn't portrayed in any convincing fashion.The script, as usual, is the key here. It is the dialog that keeps the movie interesting. The people come off as humans engaged in the difficult job of life. No-one is heroic, and no-one is atrocious, merely emotionally selfish. Cecillia for seducing a married man in order to feel wanted, and Niels for caving to his mid life urges at the expense of his family.I eagerly await Bier's foray into Hollywood with her movie about racism (Halle Berry and David Duchovny.)

jandesimpson Let me stand and be counted! I cannot see the advantages in making a film the Dogme95 way. The negation of those basic elements developed over the years to enhance cinematic craftsmanship such as studio lighting and sets, background music and many facets of camera movements can only serve to restrict creative artistry and results in a careless look that is anathema to those who admire the skill with which the best films are made. I fail to see how Dogme differs from cinema verite other than placing further restrictions and demanding that the director conform to these before qualifying for a Dogme certificate. I would love to hear from those who think me wrong and misguided in order to gain some understanding of what it is all about. Having said this however I have to admit to being tremendously impressed by the Danish "Open Hearts", so much so that five minutes into the film I completely forgot the slapdash look of it all. Why? Because I was completely caught up in a tragically human situation and such perfect casting. Another fine recent film, "21 Grams", deals with the similar situation of the aftermath of a ghastly road accident and the way it affects the characters of those involved, but does so in a technically more conventional way. It says much for the Danish film that it almost emerges as the more powerful work. Perhaps Dogme has no case to answer after all!

kostprober69 I am not very much into dogma movies - but this one is really worth looking. As always, the danish acting is superb (by the way: can anybody explain me, why actors from Denmark are so convincing every time?) I also liked the open ending, which doesn't pretend to find a solution to a nearly unsolvable problem. Furthermore, the beginning was gorgeous. Susanne Bier presents her characters in slightly normal situations - but yet that charming and vivid, you just have to love the young couple. And so you also will suffer from the incident and its consequences for them. Another interesting aspect is, that there is absolutely no antagonist in this movie - and, surprise, surprise: you won't miss one! All the characters have two sides, are protagonist and antagonist at the same time - just like in real life!