GEMINI (TVILLING), 2003
denmark

produced by Nimbus Film in Denmark.
90 minutes. preview file size: 27 mb.
PREMIERE NOVEMBER 2003
DETAILS
gemini is an award-winning feature film, a dark love story set in copenhagen. the production design created many dense and richly textured environments that reveal a striking range of neglect by their inhabitants. several of the main locations were set constructions.

this film marked the first of many collaborations with director hans fabian wullenweber and cinematographer jacob kusk.
 
as production designer, i put together a team that created the costumes and special effects (which included scenes involving rain and snow), and, of course, the set designs, location research, the decorations, and props. my entire department consisted of twelve crewmembers.  
 
d.p. jacob kusk and i synthesized our different analyses of the manuscript, creating a visual road map that ultimately resulted in this film’s dynamic and decadent look. while kusk’s camera sought out balanced and formal visual arrangements, i was drawn to the disintegration of the film’s physical settings and strived to create environments that were out of balance and wrought with imperfections. director wullenweber and i spent a lot of time breaking down the characters, while each location in the film became a character unto itself, with its own demands and its own set of obstacles and ambitions.
 
this film was a true labour of love, and a testimony to the hard work of many, many unsung heroes, without whom this film would never have been made.
 
there’s a helpful review from variety, which has been posted below:

Gothenburg, Sat., Jan. 31, 2004, 6:00pm PT
 
Gemini - Tvilling (Denmark)
 
A Vogel Film & Media, Nimbus Film, Zentropa production. (International sales: Trust Film, Hvidovre, Denmark.) Produced by Lottie Terp Jakobsen, Sussanne Vendelboe. Executive producer, Bo Ehrhardt. Directed by Hans Fabian Wullenweber. Screenplay, Wullenweber, Janus Nabil Bakrawi.
 
With: Janus Nabil Bakrawi, Trine Dyrholm, Lene Timroth, Asger Reher, Karen-Lise Mynster, Stig Hoffmeyer, Andre Babikan, Christiane Bjorg Nielsen.
 
By LESLIE FELPERIN
 
An offbeat love story sporting an uncomfortable streak of cruelty, "Gemini" reps an admirably bold departure for sophomore helmer Hans Fabian Wullenweber, who goes very dark after his affable kiddy film debut, caper comedy "Catch That Girl." Essentially about a stalker (played by co-scribe Janus Nabil Bakrawi) who gets the girl (Trine Dyrholm), pic barely blipped on the radar on local release last November, but engagements at other festivals might be in its horoscope. Film's striking visuals and skillful perfs could woo select critics and arthouse auds.
 
A brooding sense of claustrophobia is generated by confining the action mostly to a Copenhagen convenience store, and the apartments of the two leads. Cash register-jockey Lars (Bakrawi) seems to be the model employee and perfect son, liked by customers at work and relied upon by his disabled, aging vamp of a mother, Gunilda (Lene Timroth). Secretly, however, he squirrels home the store's security tapes so he can obsessively watch Julie (Dyrholm), a blonde customer who lives downstairs from him with her slick, shaven-headed b.f., Soren (Andre Babikan). He even spies on them through their letterbox.
 
When Julie faints in the shop one day, Lars carries her home to her wrecked digs where she pleads with him to stay. He's all too happy to comply, even if it risks disrupting his work and care regimen for his mother. Though Lars and Julie barely exchange a word, their relationship swiftly turns sexual, the first coupling strikingly filmed in a sweaty handheld blur.
 
A camcorder lying about reveals Soren was killed during a car accident. Before long, Julie is shaving Lars' head to make him look like her dead ex. Stepping literally into the dead man's shoes, Lars begins to unravel emotionally as well.
 
Tension peaks halfway once Lars' mom, not quite as disabled as she seems, starts snooping around, spying on them a la "Blue Velvet" from a closet.
 
Pic's determination to withhold key information about characters' backstories works against it at times. It's never explained, for example, why white Danish Gunilda has a South Asian-looking son, or why Lars finds it so easy to forget all his duties to mom in a flash of thigh. Final act smacks of screenwriters who don't know how to finish what they've started.

Pic's strongest suit is its inventive visual style. D.p. Jacob Kusk goes hell-for-leather with inverted angles, nacreous lighting (sometimes almost deliberately crude), choppy pixilation, CC-footage, and lashings of extreme close-ups. Production design in Julie and Lars' respective apartments underscores the characters.
 
Camera (color/B&W, widescreen, DV-to-35mm), Jacob Kusk; editor, Steen Schapiro; music, Ole Arnfred, Jon Sigurd Bruland; production designer, Christian Svanes Kolding; costume designer, Adriana Estrada; sound (Dolby Digital), Bjorn Vido. Reviewed at Gothenburg Film Festival (competing), Jan. 28, 2004. Running time: 90 MIN.