I am Dina

I Am Dina is a turbulent and entertaining melodrama set at a Norwegian trading post in the late 19th century.

The film's undisputed protagonist is Dina, a woman in the grip of her urges. She consumes men, and over the course of the story she manages to dispose of several of them. The film does not hold back on murder, rape, fire, suicide and sex. In the end it all becomes too much, with the many dramatic events piled one on top of the other, and Dina as a character loses her credibility.

Maria Bonnevie is fantastic as Dina, but the author Herbjørg Wassmo, whose novel the film is based on, has given her too many unsympathetic traits, which make her hard to understand. Unfortunately, Ole Bornedal has not dared to tamper with her character. It is clear, though, that her mother's violent death, which Dina inadvertently caused, has left deep scars on her soul. Her mother's ghost quite literally haunts her, and she cannot shake off the thought that people die around her. By the end of the film, however, her character becomes too psychopathic, as she thinks only of herself and not of others.

I Am Dina could have gained a great deal if all the actors had been Scandinavian and had spoken the Scandinavian languages. The film would then hardly have felt so artificial. Sadly, it has become a 'Europudding' with a hotchpotch of actors from all corners of the world, all struggling to pronounce the English language. It is one of fate's ironies that Christopher Eccleston, the only Englishman, plays Dina's Russian lover Leo and therefore has to speak with an accent.

On the plus side is Dan Laustsen's magnificent cinematography, which lifts the film considerably.