Århus by Night

Århus by Night is something of a turning point in Malmros’s work. Above all, it’s his first work not only inspired by his own experiences and observations but a reflection of his life in, with, through and for cinema. It has a highly ambiguous relationship with what we might call factual truth. Frederik, the auteur of Århus by Night, is not Malmros, even if the films he did so far bear a striking resemblance to Malmros’s (the same goes for Johannes in Sorrow and Joy which ‘takes off’, give or take, where Århus by Night stops). In its moods and tones, it’s a step away from the intimate poetics of his earlier work, moving towards a slightly folksier idiom befitting a period torn between a glibly superficial sense of the permissive and a deep-seated suspicion against any real kind of bourgeois liberty. Århus by Night is a broad comedy and a melodrama and a realist exposé. And his first film carried more by professional than amateur actors.

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