Dreams (Sex Love)
A high school girl falls head over heels for her teacher—but reality doesn’t quite match her rose-tinted dreams. The final part of Haugerud’s trilogy took home the top prize at Berlinale.
Do you remember what it’s like to be 17 and in love? Dag Johan Haugerud certainly seems to remember! With such clarity and tender precision, the Norwegian director presents us the story of Johanne, a high school girl who falls hard and fast in love with her beautiful French teacher. Johanne pours her heart-wrenching and earth-shattering experience onto paper, a text which shocks her mother and leaves her grandmother impressed by the her literary skills. Should the next move be to see a therapist or a publisher?
Dreams (Sex Love) does not revel in the student’s affection for her teacher, but approaches infatuation and complex emotions with empathy and humane interest.
Alongside the romantic fantasy story is a lively depiction of the family relationships between three generations of women, two mothers, and two daughters. There aren’t really that many men in this film — save perhaps in the grandmother’s wild dreams.
Dreams (Sex Love) completes Haugerud’s trilogy of hit films about human relationships, following Sex and Love, and won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.
There is clearly something wondrous in Norway’s drinking water, given the number of talented filmmakers and excellent films currently coming out of the country. Haugerud’s name has been on everyone’s lips and everywhere in festival programmes for the past couple of years – and for good reason! I have yet to meet anyone who, after seeing his films, has not been captivated by the director’s curious explorations of human relationships and intelligent, dialogue-driven films.
Martta Tuppurainen (translated by Moritz Müller)
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