Review of The Hunt (2013) by Thomas W — 20 Nov 2013

Danish director Thomas Vinterberg has made his best film since 1998's The Celebration (Festen) which won the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and also won him some acclaim and recognition stateside.

His films haven't been quite as sensational since that one, but The Hunt does succeed on several levels and it does an excellent job of creating emotional tension and weighing an audience down with a burdensome pressure of unease.

Mads Mikkelsen (Casino Royale) stars as a divorced and out of work school teacher named Lucas who has found work in a local kindergarten corralling kids on the playground and helping the other teachers with various tasks.

He oftentimes finds himself walking his longtime best friend's daughter, Klara, home from school as both of her parents appear to be absent-minded and forgetful and the young girl hasn't learned her way home yet (as she has a phobia of stepping on sidewalk cracks and cannot remember her way as she cannot look up as she walks).

That is ... until he slightly offends the young girl at school one day and she makes up a little story about him she shares with her teacher. The Hunt is about what happens to Lucas in such a small, tight-knit community after one of its own is accused of a heinous act and the public reacts without knowing much of the particular details.

Lukas becomes the target of a witch 'Hunt' ... and his life becomes hellish as it unravels and the audience can only sit and observe. I was intrigued by the film and found myself wholly absorbed into the drama.

Vinterburg has another winner on his hands here ... as this film should find itself up for the Best Foreign Language film Oscar this year. It is tense, highly provocative and dramatic and the acting by Mikkelsen is superb.

If only it weren't subtitled, I am certain more people would give it a watch.