Armand director Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel is the grandson of nine-time Oscar nominated Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman (The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries) and two-time Oscar nominated performing icon Liv Ullmann. In case you suppose that offers you some concept of what you’re getting with Armand, you’d solely be half proper. Ullmann Tøndel’s stress cooker drama comprises parts that draw a direct line to the existential themes, finely composed visuals, and character intimacy of his grandparents’ all-time classics. However Ullmann Tøndel, in taking a promising first step in direction of establishing himself as a director to observe, provides bits of satirical humor, commentary on trendy institutional failings, and nail-biting pressure. It’s a mixture that pays more and more fewer dividends because it rolls alongside, however the journey isn’t lower than provocative and fully immersive.
In Armand, which gained the Caméra d’Or for finest first characteristic on the 2024 Cannes Movie Competition, Ullmann Tøndel retains the proceedings primarily restricted to at least one location: an imposing and ominous-looking major college. He additionally retains the forged small and palms the difficult lead function to a as soon as once more excellent Renate Reinsve, whose star continues to rise after successful the Finest Actress award in Cannes for 2021’s The Worst Individual within the World and raised North American eyebrows along with her supporting flip in 2024’s A Completely different Man.
‘Armand’ Critiques the Institutional Failings of the Faculty System
Armand
3.5
/5
- Launch Date
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February 7, 2025
- Runtime
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116 minutes
- Director
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Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel
- Writers
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Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel
- Producers
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Joachim Trier, Renate Reinsve, Andrea Berentsen Ottmar
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Ellen Dorrit Petersen
Sarah
- Renate Reinsve is fabulous within the lead function.
- The movie maintains pressure all through by cleverly withholding info.
- Director Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel takes narrative dangers that always repay.
- Director Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel takes narrative dangers that typically do not repay.
- The movie’s surreal passages could confuse or flip off some viewers.
Reinsve performs Elisabeth, to whom we’re launched as she speeds down the street to an emergency assembly with college members on the college the place one thing has occurred involving her six-year-old son, Armand. The academics and directors are clearly dreading having to confront Elisabeth, not solely as a result of it’ll be a tough dialog, however as a result of they’re not geared up to deal with it. Faculty principal Jarle (Øysten Røger) is vaguely incompetent and his administrator, Asja (Vera Veljovic), is susceptible to working to the toilet to take care of her newest nosebleed. So the duty of delivering the dangerous information is offloaded to terrified younger trainer Sunna (a terrific Thea Lambrechts Vaulen).
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Ullmann Tøndel additionally wrote Armand’s script, and he scrupulously parcels out info in toxic little droplets and attracts out uncomfortable moments to provide as a lot nervousness as attainable. Whereas such a gambit will finally give off a whiff of calculation, initially we’re as determined as Elisabeth to know precisely what Armand has achieved. When she arrives, purposefully strutting in her tight pants, darkish purple raincoat, and noisy heels, Ullmann Tøndel has us on edge.
Much more sweat-inducing is that the assembly can’t start till the arrival of husband and spouse Anders (Endre Hellestveit) and Sarah (Ellen Dorrit Petersen), main Sunna to kill time by awkwardly asking Elisabeth concerning the climate. As soon as Anders and Sarah seem, Elisabeth is confronted with the disturbing accusation that Armand has sexually abused their six-year-old son, Jon.
The Movie’s Dangers Are Admirable however Might Not Attraction to Everybody
If Armand is starting to sound like a Norwegian amalgam of İlker Çatak’s Oscar-nominated The Trainer’s Lounge and Roman Polanski’s Carnage, you’d be within the ballpark. It is slowly revealed, although, that Ullmann Tøndel’s goals are extra gothic and surreal. Initially, Elisabeth chafes on the accusation leveled at her son, particularly as a result of he supposedly used sexually charged language that no six-year-old would know. However Armand is a troubled child (“it’s Armand once more” sighs Jarle on the movie’s starting) and Elisabeth appears not significantly better.
An actress whose husband died by suicide, Elisabeth is tough to get a bead on, which Ullmann Tøndel appears to relish (and really so can we). At one second, she’s sympathetically described as a “public determine who’s been by way of rather a lot” and the subsequent she’s dismissed as somebody who “creates drama round herself.” Regardless of our pure inclination to facet with Elisabeth, every new revelation forces us to recalibrate our opinion of her. These revelations are sometimes whispered in personal by Anders and Sarah, who’ve their very own secrets and techniques that, as soon as revealed, power us to regulate our opinion of them, as effectively.
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Finally, exterior forces are so allayed in opposition to Elisabeth that her inner protection mechanisms are activated, which sends Elisabeth and the movie down a rabbit gap that turns into summary and distancing. Ullmann Tøndel’s left flip in direction of one thing conceptual and inward-looking reveals that Armand is in the end not concerning the youngsters. In truth, the title character is mainly by no means seen, neither is Jon. Armand is basically about one mom’s psychological breakdown, and what makes this macabre flip value following is Reinsve.
Rather a lot is requested of Reinsve — Elisabeth rotates between being offended, confused, beleaguered, domineering and anguished — but she delivers. Within the movie’s finest scene, Elisabeth responds to the “new procedures” that Armand and Jon should observe whereas at college by laughing uncontrollably for a number of minutes. It’s not solely a wonderful piece of performing, but it surely serves as Elisabeth’s breaking level, sending her into psychological turmoil. However such Sturm und Drang feels much less like a pure extension of the story than Ullmann Tøndel’s headstrong want to not present a tidy ending or, worse, not realizing find out how to finish it. That is definitely one solution to clarify the nightmarish climax.
Even Alfred Hitchcock Performs a Function in ‘Armand’
Capturing on grainy 16mm movie inventory and using canted angles, gradual digital camera strikes, and even Alfred Hitchcock’s dolly zoom, cinematographer Pål Ulvik Rokseth turns Armand’s college right into a simmering cauldron the place the scholars are nowhere to be discovered, however the empty halls are stuffed with their dad and mom’ secrets and techniques. Sound designer Mats Lid Støten provides vastly to the movie’s haunted home ranges of foreboding with loud, dripping taps, lonely echoes, and the imperious clacking of high-heeled boots.
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In all, Ullmann Tøndel exhibits nice command of his toolbox, proving himself a assured and character-attuned filmmaker unafraid to steer the drama in instructions which can be as provocative as they’re dangerous. The flicks can use just a little extra risk-taking today, even those that do not fully work. From IFC Movies, Armand will probably be launched in restricted theaters starting Feb. 7, 2025, with a wider launch on Feb. 14, 2025.