It takes a certain amount of audacity on the part of a filmmaker to make a love story wherein the male lead portrays a Norwegian bachelor farmer. Consider the limitations:
• The words “torrid” and “passionate” are unlikely to ever be used to describe the film.
• The leading man’s emotional range stretches between shy detachment and quiet acquiescence.
• The audience will sit primed, expecting, anticipating, practically demanding a lutefisk joke.
Admittedly, all I ever learned about Norwegian bachelor farmers – those hearty, undemanding men who tamed the loamy soil of Minnesota – came under the tutelage of Garrison Keillor and his weekly news from Lake Wobegon. So I’m undoubtedly handicapped by the good-natured stereotyping that has been the background of Keillor’s success and the inspiration for the heretofore best-known cinematic paean to the Upper Midwest, the Coen brothers’ magnificent “Fargo.”
But what Keillor and the Coens mined for comedy, first-time feature director Ali Selim has embellished for deep pathos and, yes, passion, in “Sweet Land,” the tale of a very nearly stereotypical Norwegian bachelor farmer and the feisty mail-order bride who becomes the love of his life.
Before we’re treated to this remarkable love story, the film touches base in the recent past, as Lars Torvik wrestles with the decision to sell his grandparents’ farm, following the death of his grandmother, Inge. As he sorts through the old farmhouse, he recalls the stories she told him when he was just a boy, and soon we’re carried back to 1920.
Olaf Torvik (Tim Guinee) works his farm dutifully, year in and year out. He has a passable social life, thanks to his friendship with Frandsen (Alan Cumming) and his family. But he is still quite alone, having left his parents behind in Norway. His parents have not forgotten him, however; back in the old country, they’ve arranged for a girl who works on the neighboring farm to move to America to marry him. Ever the dutiful son (and certainly willing for companionship), Olaf agrees to pick her up.
The arrival of Inge Altenberg (Elizabeth Reaser) in the insular community, however, causes an immediate and ruthless lashing out from its natives. What no one had expected, because she was coming from Norway, was that she would not be Norwegian.
Inge is German, having fled her homeland after the death of her parents in the Great War. But to the closed-minded locals, she is not a refugee, but an enemy. The haughty minister (John Heard) forbids their marriage and grows infuriated at Inge for not being able to speak English. For the sake of propriety, Inge is sent to live with Frandsen and his wife, Brownie (Alex Kingston), while she adapts to her new environs.
As the weeks roll by, Olaf and Inge grow closer as they chafe against the community’s narrow-mindedness. Inge gains familiarity with her new language and both Frandsen’s and Olaf’s farms, while Olaf finds his own independence, coming to the realization that sometimes situations demand more than that classic shy detachment or quiet acquiescence. In the face of impending catastrophes, the two find they must stand together, against the elements and their neighbors. And, of course, in so doing they find love.
There’s a certain irony in the production of “Sweet Land,” in that a tale so focused on the pitfalls of an insular community was created by two Minnesotans. The screenplay is based on a short story by Will Weaver (from Park Rapids) and directed by Selim, who hails from Minneapolis. There’s something to be said for knowing what treasures are in your own backyard, however. Left to an out-of-state director, the film probably would have lost a measure of its spark.
Instead, Selim infuses “Sweet Land” with his own keen perceptions of the state, its land, its people and their history. He brings the expansive countryside – alternately bountiful and ruthless – into the film as a character.
“Sweet Land,” like the determined characters who live within the story, is one of those classic little films that could. It was made on a tight budget, it doesn’t have the backing of a large studio and yet it’s slowly working its way across the country to rave reviews. See it soon – it’s now playing at Plaza Frontenac – and give your support to a film that, as a Minnesotan might say, is pretty darn good.
Because all the Lutherans who were Norwegian went to Minnesota, and all the Lutherans who were German came here to Missouri, there’s a distinct lack of Norwegian restaurants in our area. That fact wouldn’t trouble the prototypical bachelor farmer; going out to eat, unless it was to a neighbor’s or a church potluck, was unheard of.
However, you can pick up an astonishing array of Norwegian culinary specialties at Global Foods Market in Kirkwood. Among its wide selection of international fare, you can find potato lefse (flatbread served with butter and jelly or sugar), brunost (a sweet, brown goat cheese sliced onto sandwiches) and fiskekaker (fish cakes) – plenty to give you an authentic taste of Norway without having to travel to St. Paul.
This article appears in Dec 1-31, 2006.