"Oslo, August 31st" opens with a montage of the titular city, revealing cobblestone streets teeming with cars, suburban sidewalks on which children play, and even the icy slopes of a ski resort. Some shots are devoid of people. In others, distant figures dot the urban landscape. We see a few close-ups of faces, a long shot of a car ride from the passenger's point of view, and a hand-held view of a lake. As these visuals unfold, random voice-over narrations play on the soundtrack – sound bites of anonymous men and women recalling their impressions of Oslo. Some are pleasant while others are indifferent, but all of them are vivid, strong, and deeply personal. We're not witnessing a celebration of life; the filmmakers are acknowledging life's directional axis in a simple, direct way. We inevitably move forward, carrying memories both good and bad.

Anders (Anders Danielsen Lie) is two weeks away from finishing a stint in rehab for alcohol and drug addiction. He has already attempted suicide by filling his jacket pockets with stones, picking up a boulder, and wading into a nearby river. He fails to go through with it. We're not all that surprised because, as he later explains during group therapy, he hasn't felt much of anything since becoming sober. Successful actions, even negative ones like taking your own life, necessitate both an emotional response and the willpower to act accordingly. He's given a one-day pass for a job interview at a literary magazine, where he's being considered for an editorial position. He will also reunite with an old party buddy, Thomas (Hans Olav Brenner),now a husband, a father, and a professor of literature.

Thomas, clearly unhappy with his lot in life, quotes Proust with restrained yet visible desperation. If Anders went to him seeking encouragement – or, at the very least, some semblance of stability and familiarity – he most certainly will not get it. This goes double for Anders' sister, who made a date to meet him at a restaurant. He instead meets her friend, who was sent solely for the purpose of passing along doubts about seeing him again. Anders tries to reconnect with his ex-girlfriend, who now lives in New York; he leaves her several voicemail messages via cell phone, all of which are unreturned. He has his job interview, which goes just as badly as he thought it would. More accurately, he allows it to go just as badly as he subconsciously wished it would go. If he truly wanted that job, he in all likelihood would have gotten it.

The rest of the film shows Anders wandering through a series of parties, bars, and clubs. He interacts with various people, including his former drug supplier and the man who had an affair with his ex-girlfriend, but never once does he connect with them. He can't connect with anyone on this side of addiction, simply because he doesn't know how to. Perhaps he knew at one time; echoing the opening voice-over narrations, Anders retreats into his head during one scene, allowing memories of his well-to-do parents to resurface as spoken recollections. Between his childhood and now is a long stretch in which he willingly forfeited any opportunity to remember something, be it happy or sad. Now that his mind is clear, he has become aware that he has absolutely nothing and cannot relate to others. He squandered his life before he ever had the chance to live it.

Loosely adapted from the novel "Le Feu Follet" by Pierre Drieu La Rochelle, the film does not make any grand gestures in depicting the aftereffects of drug addiction. Director/co-writer Joachim Trier simply observes. He never aims to make Anders a tragic victim of circumstance; he's a young man who knowingly chose to walk a self-destructive path. Perhaps he didn't know it would lead to total apathy. That doesn't matter; you don't have to actually experience it to know that addiction leads to nothing good. Although the specifics of Anders' upbringing are never revealed, we strongly suspect he came from a home that was at the very least stable, so in all likelihood, has no good excuse for being an addict.

In an early scene of "Oslo, August 31st," Anders sits alone in a café filled with people. He and the audience catch snippets of various conversations, ranging from the suicide of Kurt Cobain to a long list of lofty but positive life goals. They're intriguing in and of themselves, mostly because we're witnessing a very realistic portrayal of attitudes and behaviors, from sweet and sentimental to flippant and immature. But what I found even more intriguing was Anders' reaction to them. In expressing indifference with only anxious turns of the head and joyless smirks, he paradoxically speaks volumes about himself. This is a testament to the brilliance of Lie's performance, which, even in its nuanced state, is emotionally complex and painfully believable. As his character sits there, both he and the audience slowly begin to realize that, apart from having nothing, he has seen to it that he actually is nothing.

-- Chris Pandolfi (www.atatheaternearyou.net)

"Bookended by archival shots of Oslo (accompanied by voiceover of people's recollections of the past) and static pillow shots of places where Anders has been, OSLO also operates as an ode to the city and its denizens, a nostalgic flourish. When Anders trifles time away in a café, he pricks up his ears to hear what people talk within his earshot, contemplates their troubles and trivialities, for a second, he seems to commune with the city's vibrance and mundanity, but eventually he is ghettoized, interpersonal communication fails him, even his best friend Thomas (Brenner) can only offer him tea and sympathy, and ends up being too lazy to attend a birth party which he mentions to Anders (playing Battlefield instead, presumably),an action could have changed the course of Anders' life, if unwittingly."

Read my full review on my blog: Cinema Omnivore, thanks.

'Oslo, August 31' (2011),the second film by Norwegian director Joachim Trier, is inspired by a French novel written in 1931, which was also brought to screen by Louis Malle during the Nouvelle Vague period of his career. Trier, a great admirer of this cinematic current, transplanted the story to the Norwegian capital, which is the favorite setting of his films. In fact, the film opens with an almost documentary journey through the city, with urban sequences associated with the thoughts of its permanent or temporary inhabitants. The city is the background for the lives and problems of those who live in it or pass through it, but it does not play an active role. One of the characters expresses this indifferent relationship with a phrase that can be a motto of the film: 'Society does not save those who want to self-destruct'.

The narrative structure of the film reminded me of the American TV series '24' which was very popular 15-20 years ago. Its hero, played by Kiefer Sutherland, saves the city, America or the world within 24 hours. The hero of Joachim Trier's film, Anders (Anders Danielsen Lie),tries to save himself in the entire interval between two sunrises, and the mission proves to be no less difficult. Anders is nearing the end of a detox cure that has lasted several years. The result of the treatment is fragile. Physically, drug and alcohol addiction seems to have gone away. Psychologically, however, the motivation that makes most people continue to live beyond crises has disappeared - professional ambition, emotions in relationships with women or friends. In addition, the world has moved forward, age is beginning to show signs, friends have established families, years of absence from the CV raise questions when he is trying to get a job. The 24 hours that Anders spent in Oslo, during which he tries to renew contacts with the world from which he was absent, confronts him with the indifference of the surrounding society, all the more so as it is dressed in the velvet gloves of Scandinavian politeness and civility.

'Oslo, August 31' is not a 'feel good' film but rather a 'feel bad' one - melancholic and quite depressing. It was very difficult for me to identify in any way with the hero of the film, maybe because addiction to substances, feelings like uselessness and boredom, and the morals and codes of the world of northern Europe are foreign to me. I appreciated the way 'Oslo, August 31st' is filmed and the acting, especially Anders Danielsen Lie, although I also have a doubt about that. The role in this film is so similar to the one he played in 'Reprise', Joachim Trier's debut film, that I should see another film or more in which Danielsen Lie plays something different to be convinced by the quality and depth of his talent. Joachim Trier is without a doubt a talented director, very connected to what has happened or is happening in world cinema but also very attached to the city of Oslo where the stories in all his films that I have seen so far take place. These movies fall into the category of movies that I appreciate but not of those that I love.