As Rune (Johan Philip Asbaek), the central figure in Tobias Lindholm and Michael Noer's brutal new film, R, enters the prison that will serve as his home for two years, there is a certain, perhaps inevitable familiarity. The guards explore every cavity and crevice of his body for paraphernalia and contraband, he is shown his new room, and, before you know it, he's being ordered to send a man simply known as the Albanian to the prison hospital by a gang of tattooed thugs. Anyone who was lucky enough to see Jacques Audiard's A Prophet will recognize these events, and though R is not quite as ambitious as Audiard's film, neither in scope nor thematic weight, the 'hero' of A Prophet and Rune follow similar paths to their places in the social structure of their respective penitentiaries, both helped largely by their connections with the Arabic community.
The trading of services for comfort and protection in prison is as timeless a metaphor for the dubious ideologies of modern capitalism as prostitution. But with R, the metaphor reaches levels of violence and emotional punishment that are far more harrowing than those found in Audiard's film. Rune's savage beating of the Albanian is essentially an entrance fee, but the young prisoner, convicted of stabbing another inmate in a different prison, hasn't bought safety from the predominant gang on his block, the members of which are predominantly played by ex-cons. What eventually buys Rune refuge, and a cell with a view, is a system of passing drugs and money back and forth with the Arabic gang through the sewage pipes. The system is Rune's invention, which he collaborates on with his Arabic counterpart Rashid (Dulfi Al-Jabouri) and keeps secret from both gangs for a sizable portion of the film. It isn't until Rashid is pressured by gang leader Bazhir (a deeply scary Omar Shargawi) that the secret is thrown into the open and Rune's essential role in his gang is called into question.
The story is an oldie but a goodie, and Lindholm and Noer's script peppers the normal prison-film drudgery with some interesting nuances, not the least of which is Rune's fastidious cleaning of both his cell and the bathroom. The psychological connotations of his obsessive scrubbing and organizing are obvious, but the act also begins to take on the tone of a divine ritual. Most of all, Noer and Lindholm busy themselves with the day-to-day machinations of prison life and steer away from don't-drop-the-soap clichés. Of particular interest is Rashid and Rune's jobs in the prison cafeteria, which serve essentially as day jobs for them but also become the way Rashid pays Rune for drugs and plans drop-offs. Lindolm and Noer, working with DP Magnus Nordenhof Jønck, plainly copy the aesthetic pioneered by the Dardenne brothers but they use their setting, the since-closed Horsens Prison in Jydall, to riveting effect, invoking a sense of potent claustrophobia and paranoia in the confined cellblock.
A big winner at the Bodil Awards (Denmark's Oscars), R is as lean, grim, and gritty as one could hope a good prison film to be and its steadfast commitment to depicting the ugly violence of prison life makes it a hard film to shake. Indeed, it's the sort of film where when a senior member of the white gang explains to Rashid what a punishment ominously referred to as a "Hot Coffee" entails, you know that it will be implemented by the film's end. Perhaps this is what makes the film's climactic curveball at once so jarring and so fascinating, in that it is the sort of narrative punch to the gut that you couldn't see coming in what appears to be, in all manners, a by-the-books prison flick. And yet it offers that final, justifiably cynical outlook on the simple cause-and-effect nature of how business is done in the big house. As it is in prison, so is it in modern business: No good deed goes unpunished
The trading of services for comfort and protection in prison is as timeless a metaphor for the dubious ideologies of modern capitalism as prostitution. But with R, the metaphor reaches levels of violence and emotional punishment that are far more harrowing than those found in Audiard's film. Rune's savage beating of the Albanian is essentially an entrance fee, but the young prisoner, convicted of stabbing another inmate in a different prison, hasn't bought safety from the predominant gang on his block, the members of which are predominantly played by ex-cons. What eventually buys Rune refuge, and a cell with a view, is a system of passing drugs and money back and forth with the Arabic gang through the sewage pipes. The system is Rune's invention, which he collaborates on with his Arabic counterpart Rashid (Dulfi Al-Jabouri) and keeps secret from both gangs for a sizable portion of the film. It isn't until Rashid is pressured by gang leader Bazhir (a deeply scary Omar Shargawi) that the secret is thrown into the open and Rune's essential role in his gang is called into question.
The story is an oldie but a goodie, and Lindholm and Noer's script peppers the normal prison-film drudgery with some interesting nuances, not the least of which is Rune's fastidious cleaning of both his cell and the bathroom. The psychological connotations of his obsessive scrubbing and organizing are obvious, but the act also begins to take on the tone of a divine ritual. Most of all, Noer and Lindholm busy themselves with the day-to-day machinations of prison life and steer away from don't-drop-the-soap clichés. Of particular interest is Rashid and Rune's jobs in the prison cafeteria, which serve essentially as day jobs for them but also become the way Rashid pays Rune for drugs and plans drop-offs. Lindolm and Noer, working with DP Magnus Nordenhof Jønck, plainly copy the aesthetic pioneered by the Dardenne brothers but they use their setting, the since-closed Horsens Prison in Jydall, to riveting effect, invoking a sense of potent claustrophobia and paranoia in the confined cellblock.
A big winner at the Bodil Awards (Denmark's Oscars), R is as lean, grim, and gritty as one could hope a good prison film to be and its steadfast commitment to depicting the ugly violence of prison life makes it a hard film to shake. Indeed, it's the sort of film where when a senior member of the white gang explains to Rashid what a punishment ominously referred to as a "Hot Coffee" entails, you know that it will be implemented by the film's end. Perhaps this is what makes the film's climactic curveball at once so jarring and so fascinating, in that it is the sort of narrative punch to the gut that you couldn't see coming in what appears to be, in all manners, a by-the-books prison flick. And yet it offers that final, justifiably cynical outlook on the simple cause-and-effect nature of how business is done in the big house. As it is in prison, so is it in modern business: No good deed goes unpunished
