ROSE (2023) - Mark Reviews Movies

Rose, Game Theory Films

Follow on Facebook | Follow on Twitter | Become a Patron

Review by Mark Dujsik | November 14, 2023

Compassion exudes from Rose. It doesn't always come from its characters, since some of them don't and don't want to understand the story's main character. That quality, though, is always present in Niels Arden Oplev's film, and while it may be simple, the tone and perspective are vital to the success of material that deals with tricky, complex subject matter.

The topic is mental illness and, specifically, schizophrenia. Our central character is Inger (Sofie Gråbøl), who was diagnosed with the condition when she was a young woman and currently resides in a facility that ensures she has as comfortable a life as possible.

As for the story, it is more or less a road trip tale, in which Inger, her sister Ellen (Lene Maris Christensen), and the sister's husband Vagn (Anders W. Berthelsen) take a bus trip from their native Denmark to France with a tour group. Ellen insists the trip was her idea, because Inger spent some time in Paris before her diagnosis and the sister thinks it would be good for Inger to see the place again.

The plan for the trip, though, becomes a point of contention later on, mainly because the sisters' mother Gudrun (Karen-Lise Mynster) doesn't want Inger to travel. Understandably, the mother worries about her daughter, but that concern exists in a state of constant, suffocating doubt—mainly that Inger isn't capable of doing anything or making decisions for herself. If this was Inger's idea, would Gudrun even entertain the notion of allowing it to happen?

One of the noteworthy elements of this story is how it presents various angles of prejudice against Inger and her condition. There's the mother, who clearly wants what's best for her daughter but treats Inger as if she's a child with no sense of agency of her own. Inger can sense that, and as the tale unfolds, it becomes increasingly clear just how much awareness and agency the woman does possess, because of how much her mother's attitude affects how she sees herself and the world around her.

On the other side of that is another passenger on the bus, a teacher named Andreas (Søren Malling), who is taking a vacation with his wife Margit (Christiane G. Koch) and young son Christian (Luca Reichardt Ben Coker). From the start, he looks at Inger with disapproval and contempt, as if her very existence is worthy of scorn or outright dismissal. He and our trio of travelers come into conflict often, and if Oplev's depiction of how even the most stubborn of minds and hardest of hearts are capable of change might seem a bit too optimistic over such a short period of time, it's at least believable within the film's own hopeful frame of mind.

Mostly, though, the story is about understanding Inger and her condition to the degree that such mysteries are possible. Admirably, the filmmakers employ no gimmicks to present schizophrenia and its effects. It simply exists as a fact within this story.

Inger often hears a voice, from a figure she believes is a kind of angel (with a name that pointedly sounds a bit like her mother's and constantly tells Inger what she can't and shouldn't do), but we neither hear that voice nor see the figure from within her mind. The film is too grounded in the everyday realities and challenges of living with and caring for someone with schizophrenia to even entertain such a notion.

Those challenges are as simple as Inger saying whatever is on her mind, regardless of what other people might think of it—such as flippantly saying she feels like strangling someone, including Ellen, who knows well enough that the impulse is actually the opposite of a threat. They're also as difficult as other, physical impulses, which, in Inger's mind, she must act upon, regardless of what they might mean for her own safety.

At a rest stop, she feels compelled to help a dead hedgehog she finds on the side of the road, leading to a touching scene in which almost everyone on the bus holds an impromptu funeral service for the animal. The outlier, obviously, is Andreas, who makes his disgust with Inger just loudly enough for her to hear it. That triggers such negative feelings about herself that she feels compelled to run into traffic—not to die, but simply to get the noise to stop.

Oplev's screenplay is supposedly based on a true story, although to what extent these fictional characters have any real counterparts or in what ways the filmmaker is stretching that preface is unclear. There is a feeling of authenticity to all of it, though, because so much of Inger's experience comes from the character herself, so much of Ellen and Vagn's struggles come from a place of real love for Inger, and so much of the late story goes out of its way to offer any easy answers about the cause of Inger's condition.

Some of that, such as some back story about and a search for a former lover who broke her heart, is a bit convoluted, in the way it sets up a false notion about the condition, just to actively dismiss it. Meanwhile, the framing device of the vacation adds a layer of narrative tidiness that that gives every development, revelation, and evolution a pat deadline.

Compared to the degree of empathy for Inger and her traveling companions in Rose, though, such matters are noticeable but more or less irrelevant. At its heart, this is a story about understanding a complicated, often misunderstood mental health condition and, more importantly, the person behind the realities of and stigmas associated with it.

Back to Home

Buy Related Products