Renate Reinsve in “The Worst Person in the World" at the Figge Art Museum -- May 22.
Thursday, May 22, 6:30 p.m.
Figge Art Museum, 225 West Second Street, Davenport IA
A 2021 Academy Awards for Best International Feature Film and Best Original Screenplay whose star Renate Reinsve also won that year's Best Actress prize at the Cannes Film Festival, director/co-writer Joachim Trier's Norwegian romantic dramedy The Worst Person in the World enjoys a May 22 screening in the Figge Art Museum's Free Film at the Figge series, the latest in its presentation of distinguished, award-winning movies about the uncertain and haphazard courses that love can take.
A wistful and life-affirming work about the fluctuating desires of a woman on the cusp of 30 and her quests for love and meaning in the modern world, The Worst Person in the World is Trier's and co-screenwriter Eskil Vogt's dramatic comedy set in contemporary Oslo. It chronicles four years in the life of Julie (Renate Reinsve), a young woman who navigates the troubled waters of her love life and struggles to find her career path, leading her to take a realistic look at who she really is. The Worst Person in the World is the third film in the director's Oslo trilogy, following 2006's Reprise and 2013's Oslo, August 31st, and the movie premiered in competition at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival to widespread critical acclaim, with Renate Reinsve winning the award for Best Actress. Trier's independent hit, which grossed $12.7 million on a budget of $5.6, was also a nominee for Cannes' top prize the Palm d'Or, a Goya Award winner for Best European Film, and the National Society of Film Critics champ for supporting actor Anders Danielsen Lie.
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 96 percent of critics' reviews are positive, the Web site's consensus reading: "The Worst Person in the World concludes Joachim Trier's Oslo trilogy with a romantic comedy that delightfully subverts the genre's well-worn tropes." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 91 out of 100, based on 47 critics, indicating "universal acclaim." A review on NewCityFilm.com called it "a drama in the fashion of a romantic comedy, with serious moments woven with an assured touch into heightened feeling and occasional subjective fantasy." The Guardian's Peter Bradshaw described the film as "one of Cannes' best" and "an instant classic," while Richard Lawson of Vanity Fair called it "exquisite," declaring the work, as did The Atlantic, the best film of 2021.
The Worst Person in the World will be shown in the Davenport venue's John Deere Auditorium on May 22, admission the 6:30 p.m. screening is free, and guests are invited to socialize and discuss the film afterward with a complimentary glass of wine underwritten by Barb Zimmerman. For more information, call (563)326-7804 and visit FiggeArtMuseum.org.
