Saturday, July 21, 2007

Kitchen stories - a Norwegian film


"Salmer fra kjoekkenet" ("Psalms from the Kitchen") is the name of this film in Norwegian, but the English title is "Kitchen Stories".
My friend Anika introduced me to it. I have enjoyed it very much the two times I have watched it, though a representative of the younger generation complained the story was extremely slow, so be warned.
The BBC review is here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2003/12/19/kitchen_stories_2004_review.shtml

Historical background:
In the fifties the Swedes did a thorough study of the housewives' movements inside the kitchen in order to design a more efficient kitchen. (These days the term "housewife" would probably be replaced with "housemaker").
The argument was that within a year the average Swedish housewife walked the distance from Stockholm to Congo while preparing the family meals.

This film uses that as a background and pretends the Swedes then make an additional study of male homemakers' use of the kitchen. This comparative study is done by Swedish scientists studying Norwegian bachelors in the fictional Norwegian village of Landstad.

Being both Swedish and Norwegian myself, the film feels familiar, and funny.

Anika and her family also laughed, so perhaps you don't have to know the specific Scandinavian part in order to enjoy it.

By the way, this film was selected as Norway's 2004 Oscar candidate.

Just found another review worth reading:
http://www.reelingreviews.com/kitchenstories.htm

No comments: