Simon & the Oaks

2011 "Every family has a secret."
Simon & the Oaks
6.5| 2h2m| en| More Info
Released: 11 October 2012 Released
Producted By: Schmidtz Katze Filmkollektiv
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Synopsis

Epic story about two families and their friendship and common destiny in Sweden's Gothenburg in the 1940s and 1950s. Told from the perspective of young Simon Larsson, who learns that he's an adopted child who has a Jewish father from Germany. After WWII Simon travels to explore his roots - a journey that leads to the basic mysteries of the human life. After the bestselling novel by Marianne Fredriksson.

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Schmidtz Katze Filmkollektiv

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Reviews

Kirpianuscus it is the film who makes me consider Bill Skarsgard a great actor. the motif - off course -its performance. but, in same measure, the atmosphere, the dialogues, the science to use details, the feeling to discover a family album, with old pictures, familiar and , in same measure, strange. a war film and the map of the world of a young man. sensitive, vulnerable, strong, brave, viewer and judge, Simon is a guide for the steps from an universe to the other. a guide who seems be reflection of yourself. and this fact does the film a kind of scent. not the story itself but the state of characters, like a large ball remains after the final credits. a film to see. for discover an old way to see the near reality.
Moviegoer19 I found this film on Netflix and watched it without expectations, except for an ongoing interest in films that are in some way about WWII and the Holocaust. I wasn't disappointed, though felt that it may have been a bit drawn out toward the end. What I liked most was its unpredictable plot turns. I liked the way the two boys pretty much switched families, that the parents of each were able to go along with what seemed to feel right. As a student and practitioner of psychology, I was fascinated with the way the concept of "genetic memory" was included vis a vis a boy feeling as if he had already heard music without knowing he had a father who was a violinist. I gave it a 7-star vote because I think there may have been too much going on which made the film feel more superficial than it should have.
talltchr World War II experienced from an oblique angle. The characters are just far enough from the vortex that their lives are spared, but not so far as to avoid its terror or the antisemitism that changes the course of their lives, Jew and gentile alike, by pervasive fear. Special mention should be made of the character Isa played by Katharina Schüttler. She's a young woman who emerged from Auschwitz traumatized and reckless. From the actress's first moment on screen, we see that this is someone we have never encountered before. Perhaps in another generation she might have become Stieg Larsson's Lisbeth (Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, et al) but in this film, she's a well of anger and fatalism. She's the wild card that makes Simon realize there are limits to his rebelliousness. Indeed, all the characters test their limits: Karin to have an affair, Erik to maintain his anger and jealousy, Inga to keep either the love of her life or her son, Isak to enter the world, Reuben to satisfy his desires. The film is unfailingly absorbing and, despite a few fanciful scenes with the tree and the clouds, utterly genuine.
stensson Two boys meet at school in Gothenburg 1939. They become friends. One is a Jew and one is supposed not to be. One is upper middle class and one comes from a working class background.Quite much is foreseeable here, but the greatest problem is the acting. Not that it's disastrous or even bad during the circumstances, but there are plenty of anachronisms here. From the laboring father, who is something out of the 60s, more than 1939. To the boys, who have a way of staring into the camera, which is common-piece in every Swedish movie, which tries to portrait harsh times. Especially if it's the 40s. "Something is going on inside that boy". The problem is that we know exactly what, when he has those eyes.That is disturbing and takes quality out of this film.