Pelle the Conqueror

Another lit-to-film proposition based on the book of the same name by Danish communist author Martin Anderson Nexø. The film depicts the plight of an elderly and recently widowed father Lasse Karlsson (Max von Sydow) and his son Pelle (Pelle Hvenegaard) as they endure a forced re-location to Denmark from their native Sweden. The film, set in the late nineteenth century, portrays the Karlssons’ time at Stone Farm where their immigrant status places them at the bottom rung of the farm workers social ladder.

What waxes?

1. The early port scene where father and son are repeatedly rejected by Danish farmers looking for cheap Swedish slave labour is laced with pathos and quickly fills the viewer’s sympathy bank. 
2. Max von Sydow as the elderly, mumbling, cowardly, bumbling father provides a performance to remember.
3. The coincidentally-named (?) boy-actor, Pelle Hvenegaard, endures the harsh physicality of his role with admirable ease. Regrettable that we’ve not seen his career flourish as a result.
4. The side story of Erik Erikson, the giant farm labourer who befriends Pelle in his early days at Stone Farm promising to bring the young Swede on his planned escape to America but who ends up a pitiful retard as a result of a farmyard altercation.

What wanes?

1. Too many sub-plots seeking to reveal the various tribulations of an extensive cast of minor characters. With the exception of the story of the giant Erik, these fail in both their individual depth as well as in their contribution to the main story. 
2. The run time of 157 minutes is a big ask for even the most ardent among us. The film focusses only on the first section of the novel (Boyhood). The other section of the novel (Apprenticeship, The Great Struggle and Daybreak) trace Pelle’s travels through Italy and his eventual rise to become a leading trade unionist – see the etext at Project Guthenberg http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/7795. Perhaps we might have expected more of Pelle’s life story to be packaged into such a long run time.

NG rates this as 7.5 nutty gizzards.

 

New day, new dawn

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All this and it is still not found wanting of breathe. 

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