Stellan Skarsgård Movies
A Swedish actor who has become known to American audiences thanks to roles in Breaking the Waves and Good Will Hunting, Stellan Skarsgård is one of Scandinavia's best-known and most well-respected performers. Renowned for giving measured characterizations that draw their strength from a delicate complexity, Skarsgård is one of those rare actors who is able to do strong work regardless of the quality of the material he is in, displaying the sort of quiet fortitude that allows him to survive even the worst screen fiascos.Born in Gothenburg on June 13, 1951, Skarsgård became a star in his country, when, as a teenager, he was cast on the TV series Bombi Bitt och jag. After his film debut in 1972, he did years of stage work with Stockholm's Royal Dramatic and made a number of dramas with the director Hans Alfredson, the most notable of which, Den Enfaldige Mordaren, featured Skarsgård in a Silver Berlin Bear-winning performance as a misunderstood man with a deformity. In 1988, Skarsgård got a tentative introduction to a transatlantic audience with a small role in Philip Kaufman's The Unbearable Lightness of Being; two years later, he had a similarly minor role in another international hit, The Hunt for Red October.
Skarsgård's true international breakthrough came courtesy of his role as Emily Watson's husband in Lars Von Trier's highly acclaimed Breaking the Waves (1996). The actor more than held his own opposite Watson, who gave one of the year's most lauded performances, and he found previously unimagined opportunities available to him in Hollywood. In 1997, he starred as a frustrated mathematician in Gus Van Sant's award-winning Good Will Hunting and was also featured in Steven Spielberg's Amistad; his work in both films culminated in an Outstanding European Achievement in World Cinema award from the European Film Academy. Later that same year, the actor appeared in My Son the Fanatic as a German businessman with the unfortunate surname of Schitz -- he also gave a stellar portrayal of a detective who slowly loses his mind while investigating a murder in the Norwegian film Insomnia.
A prolific actor, Skarsgård appeared in a number of small ambitious projects in 2000, including Passion of Mind with Demi Moore, Mike Figgis' Time Code, and Harlan County War. The following year, while he showed up in the poorly-received thriller The Glass House, Skarsgård gained critical praise for his performance in Taking Sides.
2003 saw Skarsgård taking a role in Lars von Trier's highly anticipated Dogville and signing on for the oft-plagued The Exorcist: The Beginning. After several debacles, the prequel to the horror classic finally found its way to movie theaters in 2004, the same year the actor costarred in Antoine Fuqua's King Arthur. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide
- 2000
Following up on his critically successful debut, Sunday (1997), which won top prizes at the Sundance Film Festival, Jonathan Nossiter directs this romantic drama about a man obsessed with coincidence, serendipity, and the preternatural. Alec Skarsgard (Stellan Skarsgard) is a Stockholm-born American who lives in Athens and works as a commodities trader. He takes great pride in his ability to perceive patterns and trends in the daily undulations of the market and thereby turn a huge profit. In his private life, he also obsesses over random incidents and occurrences, looking for a deeper meaning in the chaos of everyday life. Though he loves his longtime wife Marjorie (Charlotte Rampling) and their two teenaged children, he finds that he cannot resist the seductive wiles of his co-worker Katherine (Deborah Kara Unger). He soon breaks the illicit affair off in an effort to save the marriage. Yet when he accidentally bumps into Katherine on a family ski trip, believing it fateful coincidence, he leaves with his co-worker and files for divorce. Later, Katherine reveals that she concocted their fortuitous meeting. Aghast, Alec promptly spurns her and returns to his soon-to-be ex-wife. Since she has already taken up with Greek intellectual Andreas (Dimitris Katalifos), Marjorie is less than enthusiastic about reconciling. Meanwhile, Katherine follows Alec and informs him that she is pregnant. This film was screened at the 2000 Berlin Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Charlotte Rampling, (more)
Although mako sharks are among the fastest and deadliest predators in the ocean, they're not as smart as humans -- at least, they weren't. However, Dr. Susan McAlester (Saffron Burrows) has been using mako sharks as her test subjects for research on the regeneration of human brain tissues. McAlester has altered the DNA of several sharks, raising them close to the level of human intelligence; the sharks have also become faster and stronger in the process. While these DNA experiments have yielded fascinating results, they're also of questionable ethics and legality, earning her the distrust of several members of her crew, including shark authority Carter Blake (Thomas Jane and cook "Preacher" Dudley (LL Cool J). The financial backers of these experiments have also expressed skepticism, so when McAlester is ready to perform some major tests, financier Russell Franklin (Samuel L. Jackson) arrives for the occasion. McAlester and her team are delicately extracting brain tissue from one of the altered makos when the animal regains consciousness - and becomes very angry. The shark not only attacks the researchers but also damages the floating lab, leaving the crew aboard a literally sinking ship, with the makos eager to go a few rounds - in an arena that favors sharks. Deep Blue Sea was directed by Renny Harlin, and filmed in Mexico at Fox Studios Baja in the underwater filming facilities created for James Cameron's Titanic. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Thomas Jane, Saffron Burrows, (more)
After producer Oliver Stone saw Serbian director Peter Antonijevic's political drama The Little One (1992), he sent him Robert Orr's screenplay, which Orr based on the true story of an American mercenary in Bosnia. Orr had been a photographer's assistant during the war. Thus, Antonijevic directed the first 100% American-funded film about the Yugoslav conflict, beginning with a Paris prologue: Former U.S. military official Joshua (Dennis Quaid) entered the Foreign Legion after his wife (Nastassja Kinski) was killed in Paris by Muslim fundamentalists. Six years later, in Bosnia during 1993, Joshua and his pal Peter (Stellan Skarsgard), fight together on the Serbian side. After Peter dies from a grenade tossed by a young girl, Joshua shoots another youth on the side of the enemy. In a prisoner exchange, psycho Serb Goran (Sergej Trifunovic), a Muslim-hater, and Joshua wind up with pregnant Vera (Natasa Ninkovic), victim of a Muslim rape. When Goran threatens to shoot her baby, Joshua kills Goran. After Vera rejects the child, her family turns against her, and Joshua drives mother and child to a refugee center. Eventually, Joshua attempts to get Vera and her baby out of the country, but they encounter death-dealing Croatian marauders. Filmed in Montenegro, Savior was shown at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival and the 1998 Sochi Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dennis Quaid, Nastassja Kinski, (more)
John Frankenheimer directed this $20 million international action thriller from a screenplay by Richard Weisz (pseudonym for David Mamet) and J.D. Zeik. In Paris, Irish organizer Deidre (Natascha McElhone) assembles a team to grab a mysterious briefcase from criminals. They are never told who hired them or the true identity of their targets. The hired specialists: Former CIA officer Sam (Robert De Niro), former Euro intelligence agent Vincent (Jean Reno), German electronics expert Gregor (Stellan Skarsgard), driver Larry (Skip Sudduth), and British weapons wrangler Spence (Sean Bean). After a Seine shootout, the action moves to the South of France, with a recon mission in Cannes, and a chase that brings everyone to Nice. Inevitable betrayals ensue, along with more pursuits. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert De Niro, Jean Reno, (more)
- 1998
This Swedish-Norwegian-Danish children's film is an adaptation of the popular 1964 children's book by Maria Gripe, a classic translated into more than 20 languages. Author Gripe refused to allow a film version until she saw Gronos' adaptation of her novel Agnes Cecilia. Set in the 19th Century, the tale has Snow Queen overtones as the spoiled woman of a royal family wants children for the cold corridors of her vast, sterile castle. After her husband kidnaps the glassblower's children, they are turned into amnesiacs and forced to live in the castle, where they are tortured and abused by their tutor, a weird witch. Production design by Jan Olof Agren contrasts the two settings -- the warmth and art of the glassblower's realistic world as opposed to the heightened sense of dread lurking throughout the mythical and stylized castle. Shown at the 1998 Gothenburg Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Pernilla August, (more)
In a small city in the English midlands, a Pakistani immigrant named Parvez (Om Puri) works long hours driving a cab to provide modest comfort for his disapproving wife, Minoo (Gopi Desai), and better opportunities for his collegiate son, Farid (Akbar Kurtha). When Farid breaks off his engagement with the daughter of the city's white police commissioner, drops out of university and joins a cell of Islamic fundamentalists, Parvez must bide his time and hope that his son will come around to his own liberal, assimilationist views. Meanwhile, a monied German entrepreneur named Schitz (Stellan Skarsgard) arrives in town on business and retains Parvez's services as not only driver but navigator of the city's steamy underbelly. Parvez recommends the services of Bettina (Rachel Griffiths), a local hooker with whom he has struck up an unlikely but warm friendship. Schitz's callous treatment of both of his new employees soon, however, sickens Parvez. After his son convinces Parvez to let a visiting holy man move into the family home, the conflicts between Parvez's nocturnal activities and his home life escalate. The screenplay was adapted by Hanif Kureishi from his own short story, which appears in the collection Love in a Blue Time. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
- 1997
Morten Arnfred and Lars von Trier's second chapter in the ongoing Danish television series The Kingdom chronicles the further misadventures of the staff and patients of an ultramodern Copenhagen hospital located atop an ancient, haunted swamp. The film opens with Judith (Birgitte Raaberg) giving birth to her mutant child (Udo Kier). Dr. Stig Helmer (Ernst-Hugo Järegård) is coming under heavy scrutiny for a botched operation that left a patient brain dead, and beginning to dabble in the dark arts in order to ward off those seeking an end to his career. Hypochondriac Mrs. Drusse (Kirsten Rolffes) finally does have something bad happen to her medically when an ambulance hits her. This is supposedly the second of a planned three-part story. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ernst-Hugo Järegård, Kirsten Rolffes, (more)
This Steven Spielberg-directed exploration into a long-ago episode in African-American history recounts the trial that followed the 1839 rebellion aboard the Spanish slave ship Amistad and captures the complex political maneuverings set in motion by the event. Filmed in New England and Puerto Rico, the 152-minute drama opens with a pre-credit sequence showing Cinque (Djimon Hounsou) and the other Africans in a violent takeover of the Amistad. Captured, they are imprisoned in New England where former slave Theodore Joadson (Morgan Freeman), viewing the rebels as "freedom fighters," approaches property lawyer Baldwin (Matthew McConaughey), who attempts to prove the Africans were "stolen goods" because they were kidnapped. Running for re-election, President Martin Van Buren (Nigel Hawthorne) overturns the lower court's decision in favor of the Africans. Former President John Quincy Adams (Anthony Hopkins) is reluctant to become involved, but when the case moves on to the Supreme Court, Adams stirs emotions with a powerful defense. The storyline occasionally cuts away to Spain where the young Queen Isabella (Anna Paquin) plays with dolls; she later debated the Amistad case with seven U.S. presidents. The character portrayed by Morgan Freeman is a fictional composite of several historical figures. For authentic speech, the Africans speak the Mende language, subtitled during some scenes but not others. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Morgan Freeman, Anthony Hopkins, (more)
Norwegian filmmaker Erik Skjoldbjaerg makes his directorial debut with the psychological police drama Insomnia. Swedish homicide detective Jonas Engström (Stellan Skarsgård) and his partner, Erik Vik (Sverre Anker Ousdal), arrive in a small Northern Norwegian town to help the local police investigate the murder of a teenage girl. When Jonas finds the girl's backpack, he sets a trap for the killer near a remote shed. While waiting to make an ambush in the morning fog, Jonas accidentally shoots Erik. He knows it was only an accident, but he decides to keep it a secret because he could lose his job. Jonas chooses to carry on with his investigation while trying to cover up the evidence of Erik's death. Meanwhile, he's unable to get any sleep due to the constant sunlight of the Norwegian summer and his increasingly guilty conscience. His only help comes from highly intuitive local police officer Hilda Haugen (Gisken Armand), who begins to form her own doubts about Jonas. As he continues to lose his grip on the case at hand, he becomes dangerously close to the suspects, Jon Holt (Bjørn Floberg) and Frøya (Marianne O. Ulrichsen). Filmmaker Christopher Nolan directed the English-language remake of Insomnia in 2002 with Al Pacino, Robin Williams, and Hilary Swank. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Gisken Armand, (more)
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck co-scripted and star in this drama, set in Boston and Cambridge, about rebellious 20-year-old MIT janitor Will Hunting (Damon), gifted with a photographic memory, who hangs out with his South Boston bar buddies, his best friend Chuckie (Affleck), and his affluent British girlfriend Skylar (Minnie Driver). After MIT professor Lambeau (Stellan Skarsgard) stumps students with a challenging math formula on a hallway blackboard, Will anonymously leaves the correct solution, prompting Lambeau to track the elusive young genius. As Will's problems with the police escalate, Lambeau offers an out, but with two conditions -- visits to a therapist and weekly math sessions. Will agrees to the latter but refuses to cooperate with a succession of therapists. Lambeau then contacts his former classmate, therapist Sean McGuire (Robin Williams), an instructor at Bunker Hill Community College. Both are equally stubborn, but Will is finally forced to deal with both his past and his future. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Matt Damon, Robin Williams, (more)
- 1996
A married barber finds himself faced with difficult choices and ends up seeking solace in the arms of another woman in this Swedish comedy. Harry cuts hair in prisons and other government institutions. He, his wife Anna and their seven children lived in a crowded house filled with various relatives, immigrants, and guests that just won't leave. His need to decide arises when his wife announces that she is moving to South America. While trying to escape the tumult of his home life and make a choice, Harry encounters the beautiful Sonja, a fortyish lifeguard married to a soldier of fortune. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
With Breaking The Waves, director Lars von Trier fashions an often disturbing tale of the singular power of love. Bess (the Oscar-nominated Emily Watson) is a naïve, borderline simple young woman who lives in a Scottish coastal town ruled by the religious doctrine of its council of elders. Recovering from a mental breakdown caused by the death of her brother, Bess marries a rough yet compassionate and attentive oil rig worker named Jan (Stellan Skarsgård). For a brief time, the couple enjoys peaceful wedded bliss, with the worldly Jan introducing Bess to the mysteries of sex. Jan must soon return to his job on the rig, however, where he is paralyzed from the neck down in a freak accident. Bess' emotional trauma over Jan's injury turns into obsession as she prays to God for his recovery and offers to do anything to have her husband back whole. Jan, constantly medicated and profoundly depressed, asks Bess to have sex with other men and tell him about it, thinking this will allow her to return to a normal life. Bess, on the other hand, sees it as an expression of her devotion to Jan that even God won't be able to ignore. Bess' resultant downward spiral leads to a finale of both tragedy and spirituality. Breaking the Waves is widely regarded as one of the most distinctive European movies of the 1990s, marking von Trier's movement toward his influential Dogma 95 school of filmmaking, which emphasizes realistic situations of contemporary life, filmed without background music and with a hand-held, restlessly moving camera. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Emily Watson, Stellan Skarsgård, (more)
A sort of Arctic existentialist drama, this Norwegian film was mostly shot in bleak conditions on a frigid island off the northern Scandanavian coast. It is based on a novel about a poet in Oslo in the 1920s, Henrik Larsen (Garb B. Eidsvold). He wants to marry Gertrude (Camilla Martens), but she refuses his proposal. Larsen goes to work for a fur trading company and is assigned to a year in Greenland. At a trapping outpost, he is welcomed rudely by the arrogant, brutish Randbaek (Stellan Skarsgard). Also at the post is the scientist Holm (Bjorn Sundquist). Randbaek , who despises women, constantly ridicules Larsen, stealing his diary and laughing at his affection for Gertrude. Despite being an intellectual, Larsen proves capable of getting more furs than Randbaek. The jealous Randbaek begins to take measures to "even the competition." ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Garb B. Eidsvold, (more)
- 1993
- R
Roland (Jesper Salen) is a boy growing up in Stockholm. It is the middle of the 1920s, and he suffers from the twin handicaps of being Jewish and the son of a socialist. However, despite the taunts and bullying he endures, he gets in a few licks of his own, and manages to have some fun (and get some revenge on his tormentors). One particularly successful ploy of his is to take some of the illegal condoms his mother is selling in her tobacco store and use them to power some slingshots he has made, sellling them to neighborhood boys. This affectionate, richly detailed portrait of a man's early adolescence in pre-war Stockholm is based on an autobiographical novel by Roland Schutt) ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård
- 1993
Tove and Claes Salefalk (Helena Bergstrom and Reine Bynolfsson) and Liselott and Lennart Waltner (Ewa Froling and Peter Andersson) have known one another for years. At one time the two couples were good friends, but they have drifted apart recently. Both couples compete internationally as ballroom dancers, and both are very good, but the Waltners are better. They keep winning competition after competition, leaving the Salefalks in the dust. After a while, Tove just can't bear it, which is why, by the time they gather for the funeral of Claes' mother, they haven't spoken for almost a year. Meeting at the funeral, they attempt to renew their relationship, and take a vacation together in Barbados. However, close proximity only makes the tension worse. Another thing which bugs Tove is that she is sterile and can't have children, while Liselott gets pregnant and has one abortion after another. Things come to a head during a competition at Blackpool, an oceanside resort in northern England. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Helena Bergström, Reine Brynolfsson, (more)
- 1992
Carl Hamilton is in one sense a peculiar sort of secret agent in that he has a license to kill but applies his conscience to that license far more often than is comfortable for him. In another sense, since he is Swedish, it makes sense that this would be so. In this story, one of a series of successful films based on this character from the novels of Jan Guillou, he has been given the task of infiltrating a group of terrorists operating out of Hamburg, who reportedly intend to attack the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm. After falling in love with one beautiful terrorist, he attempts to get her to change her ways by the force of moral persuasion rather than arms. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Katja Flint, (more)
Wind is set in the world of competitive yacht racing, where a young sailor (Matthew Modine) is intent on winning the America's Cup, as well as regaining the affections of his ex-girlfriend (Jennifer Grey). As the film opens, Modine chooses to race the America's Cup instead of staying with Grey. She leaves him and his team loses the race, leaving him devastated. Modine tracks Grey down, finding her with a new boyfriend, who happens to be an engineer. He persuades her and her new boyfriend to help him build a new yacht, which he plans on using in his pursuit to regain the America's Cup. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Matthew Modine, Jennifer Grey, (more)
- 1991
- NR
Based on a true story, the bleak period piece Oxen was co-written and directed by Ingmar Bergman's longtime cinematographer Sven Nykvist. In the small village of Småland in the late 1860s, Helge Roos (Stellan Skarsgård) works as a farmer on an estate belonging to Svenning Gustafsson (Lennart Hjulström) and his wife (Liv Ullmann). Plagued by a terrible famine, Helge illegally kills one of the Gustaffson's last oxen so his own family can eat. He and his wife, Elfrida (Ewa Fröling), feel guilty about it, but the meat keeps them alive through the winter. When he tries to sell the hide in the spring, a clergyman (Max Von Sydow) finds out and encourages him to confess. The judge sentences Helge to a life of manual labor at the state prison for his crime. When he is finally pardoned and released after six years, he returns home to Elfrida to find out that she has been supporting the family by performing sexual services, which has resulted in the birth of another child. In the 1970s, Von Sydow and Ullmann appeared together in a set of films also dealing with the Swedish famine in Jan Troell's The Emigrants and The New Land. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Ewa Fröling, (more)
This historical drama chronicles the struggle of Swedish businessman Raoul Wallenberg (Stella Skarsgard), as he fought valiantly to save the lives of the Jewish residents of Nazi-occupied Budapest. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Katharina Thalbach, (more)
- 1990
Most TV movie reference books have given up mentioning the hundreds of unsold pilots that dot the video landscape. Parker Kane, originally telecast in 1990 and then rerun in 1992, is one of those orphans that has fallen through the research cracks. It's possible the film is due for a revival thanks to the present-day popularity of its star Jeff Fahey. Fahey plays Parker Kane, a cop turned private eye. Always a maverick, albeit an honest one, Kane supersedes the authority of his p.i. license when a close friend is murdered. The trail of clues leads to a major-scale scam involving the dumping of toxic waste. Guest star Patti LaBelle plays a nightclub singer during the less hectic moments of Parker Kane. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
The first of several films based on Tom Clancy's "Jack Ryan" technothrillers, Hunt for Red October stars Alec Baldwin as eccentric CIA analyst Ryan and Sean Connery as Soviet submarine commander Marko Ramius. Ramius sets the plot in motion when he murders his political adviser, burns his orders, and steers his sub Red October towards American waters, hoping to defect. The CIA, aware that the Red October was about to embark on an evasive mission to demonstrate its ability to avoid detection and fire its nuclear missiles upon U.S. installations, believes that Ramius is insane, and that he plans to start World War III. To cover their own behinds, the Russians back up the CIA's suspicion. Only Jack Ryan believes that Ramius' mission is not as apocalyptic as it seems -- and it is Ryan who is assigned to infiltrate the Red October to prove his theory. The sort of film that in an earlier era would have been called a "thinking man's thriller," The Hunt for Red October ushered in a new series of Hollywood-produced post-Cold War adventure films, including 1995's Crimson Tide. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin, (more)
- 1989
The English-language title of this Swedish costume drama is The Women on the Roof. Set in 1914 Stockholm, the film explores the friendship between Austrian photographer Helena Bergstrom and farm girl Amanda Ooms. Despite their radically different backgrounds, both learn a lot about life from one another until their relationship is strained by the intrusive presence of Anna's boyfriend (Stellan Skarsgard). The director/co-writer of Kvinnorna Pa Taket is Carl-Gustaf Nykvist, son of celebrated cinematographer Sven Nykvist. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Amanda Ooms, Helena Bergström, (more)
- 1989
In order to try and patch up their failing marriage, Annika (Lena Olin) and Klas (Stellan Skarsgard) have purchased the "S/Y Gladjen," a shipwrecked yacht, at bargain basement prices, and have succeeded in fixing it up. They intend to take a year off from their lives and sail around the world in it, repairing the damage to their union that was caused by the death of their child. In the course of getting ready to sail, Annika discovers that the yacht's previous owners had suffered a similar loss, and begins to investigate. This mystery is based on the novel S/Y Gladjen by Inger Alfven. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lena Olin, Stellan Skarsgård, (more)
- 1989
This international thriller is allegedly based on a true incident in which Israeli secret agents bearing Lebanese passports killed a Moroccan guest worker living in Sweden because they believed he was a Palestinian terrorist. In the story, Hamilton (Stellan Skarsgard), a Swedish naval officer, is recruited by his country's secret service to investigate the suspicious killing of an expert on Middle Eastern affairs. When he discovers that the killer was probably Israeli, he is officially taken off the case. Being a persistent fellow, he refuses to take the hint, and travels to Lebanon to follow up on his leads. This stirs up a real hornets nest, leading to his having a climactic confrontation with Israeli assasins when he gets back home in Sweden. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stellan Skarsgård, Lennart Hjulström, (more)
- 1988
- R
- Add The Unbearable Lightness of Being to QueueAdd The Unbearable Lightness of Being to top of Queue
In Philip Kaufman's surprisingly successful film adaptation of Czech author Milan Kundera's demanding 1984 bestseller, Daniel Day-Lewis stars as Tomas, an overly amorous Prague surgeon, while Juliette Binoche plays Tereza, the waiflike beauty whom he marries. Even though he's supposedly committed, Tomas continues his wanton womanizing, notably with his silken mistress Sabina (Lena Olin). Escaping the 1968 Russian invasion of Prague by heading for Geneva, Sabina takes up with another man and unexpectedly develops a friendship with Tereza. Meanwhile, Tomas, who previously was interested only in sex, becomes politicized by the collapse of Czechoslovakia's Dubcek regime. The Unbearable Lightness of Being may be too leisurely for some viewers, but other viewers may feel the same warm sense of inner satisfaction that is felt after finishing a good, long novel. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Daniel Day-Lewis, Juliette Binoche, (more)
