Cinema
Nine Lives
Ni liv
Arne Skouen · 1957
Synopsis
In 1943, Jan Baalsrud and other resistance fighters trained in Britain leave the Shetlands with weapons and explosives for northern Norway. Betrayed and caught by a German ship, they destroy their cargo, and Baalsrud is soon the only survivor. Having lost a boot, he swims across an inlet and then tries to reach Sweden on skis; blinded by the snow and gnawed by frostbite, he owes his survival only to the people of the farms, a midwife, a fisherman, a couple, who hide him one after another.
Context
The film was released on 11 November 1957; the screenplay, by the director himself, follows David Howarth's book on the real escape of Jan Baalsrud, and Jack Fjeldstad plays the lead. It was nominated in 1958 for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Madhulika Liddle reports that in 1991 Norwegian television viewers voted it the country's best film, and Flickers in Time notes the herds of reindeer driven by the Sami in the storm.
Who it is for
An hour and thirty-six minutes, in Norwegian, in which cold and waiting take up more room than action.
Prizes and reception
Voted best Norwegian film of all time in 2005 by a jury of critics.
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