Anders Thomas Jensen is the Danish film-maker and screenwriter best known for his script collaborations with Susanne Bier on movies such as In a Better World, The Brothers and Love Is All You Need – he also co-wrote Kristian Levring’s western The Salvation. Here is his latest credit as writer-director: a gamey, tangy and strange gothic horror comedy carried off in a deadpan macabre style.
There is something distinctly nasty in the woodshed. Mads Mikkelsen and David Dencik star as Elias and Gabriel, two middle-aged half-brothers with weird mannerisms and what can charitably be described as undiagnosed learning difficulties. From a videotaped message left to them by their late father, they discover that they are adopted, and are the progeny of an elderly geneticist living on a remote Danish island. They arrive to discover their other three half-siblings living in squalor amid the result of their biological father’s indoor-barnyard breeding experiments.
However uglified with makeup, Mikkelsen brings his natural charisma to the role of Elias; maybe too much charisma, considering what a creepy screwup Elias is. There is plenty of black humour and broad knockabout material involving people getting hit with stuffed animals. The gigantic, chaotic family home is itself a wonder.
