The Orheim Company

It’s 1985 in Stavanger, Norway and Jarle Orheim can’t wait for the Live Aid concert. An earnest preteen with a belief in the power of music, he’s standing by to record it off the TV. But, as always, his father Terje intervenes and drags him off to the coast for a history lesson. Terje is obsessed with the Norwegian resistance fighters of WWII. It’s their sense of unity that’s important, he lectures Jarle and his mom: they worked as a team, each according to his ability. But with increasing frequency, Terje is getting ragingly, abusively drunk, and Jarle’s mom is helpless to defend them. Growing into his teenage years, Jarle starts spending time at anti-racist rallies and his sadness at Terje’s alcoholic decline turns to fury. Based on a trilogy by Tore Renberg, THE ORHEIM COMPANY is a searing family drama that depicts, with painstaking attention to period detail and a delicate sense of nuance, how the little company of three Orheims gradually stops marching in unison. (In Norwegian with subtitles) – B.B.