BALTIC EXCHANGES : 4th report from Tallinn (‘The Boss of It All’)

Published on: December 9th, 2006

seen Saturday 9th December:

THE BOSS OF IT ALL
[7/10] : Direktøren for det hele : Denmark 2006  : Lars 'VON' TRIER : 110m

#9 London Film Festival patrons comment…
2006-10-21 – Posted by Philip
The opening is ironic – the cameraman for The Boss of it All was a computer. In a Guardian interview, Von Trier said Automavision was "developed with the intention of limiting human influence". Hm. It results in fairly frequent, slight jumps in scenes, presumably as cameras switch or move. Or perhaps the whole is assembled from the best cuts of footage showing the ceiling or walls. At first it's confusing: we have learnt – by going to cinemas – that such jumps signify short lapses of time; here they don't. Viewers learn this from noticing that dialogue continues unbroken over jumps, lighting is unchanged, and there's no reason in the story for elapsed time. Consciously, that is; the subjective experience is still the same, lending the film a sense of serial glimpses, a feeling we're not seeing the 'whole story'. A happy accident, then, for this is just the situation in which the Actor-Boss finds himself. I have found myself exploring strange paths – not so much in thinking about the movie as about how it was made. This is a Lars von Trier film.

#2 The Guardian newspaper (Geoffrey MacNab) on Automavision…
Von Trier being Von Trier, The Boss of It All has one very perverse twist: it was made without a cameraman. "For a long time, my films have been handheld," he explains. "That has to do with the fact that I am a control freak."

#5 Time Out magazine (Dave Calhoun) on The Boss of It All's premiere…
It's funny – but also a more thoughtful work than von Trier admits. It works both as light Shakespearean comedy – it thrives on disguise and misidentity – and as an allegory for the relationship between directors and actors.  'All the jokes are things that I find funny,' says von Trier,  'and some of it, from what I could hear at the screening, nobody else finds funny at all.'

#10 From the IMDb message-board…
- Anyone know what this is about? 
- It's a comedy. I think the plot is something about a director for a small business who is too kind to fire anybody or make other tough decisions so he hires somebody to pretend to be him and do that for him.
I am insane and you are my insanity. 

#3 Time Out magazine (Dave Calhoun) on The Boss of It All's premiere…
About 20 journalists from all over Europe squeezed into Zentropa's makeshift screening-room – some on chairs, some on cushions on the floor – to watch The Boss of it All. As expected, the promise of a  'comedy' from von Trier shouldn't be taken entirely at face value. That said, the film turns out to be his most accessible and certainly his funniest film since  'The Idiots', with which it certainly shares some qualities of atmosphere and look.

#12 From the IMDb message-board…
- The Danish title on this site is wrong "Direktøren Fí…R det hele". It's "Direktøren FOR det hele". "Fí…R" means "GETS" and "FOR" just means "FOR". 
- actually it's more common to translate "for" with "of". "The manager of it all", it's sort of a clumsy translation. In a certain context, like in a situation where you would be trading something for another, this title could indicate that one would exchange the manager for everything else. 
- Hey what the Danish translation for, "You guys are retarded." 
- I can translate "You are retarded" – Du er retarderet 

#8 London Film Festival patrons comment…
2006-10-21 – Posted by Philip
Signs of Von Trier's pre-occupation: in the opening scene, a film-maker rides a camera crane outside an office block, reflected in the glass; in the plot, an actor is hired to play a character alien to him, of whom he knows nothing, in a business he can't comprehend; a fictional Boss everyone believes is real. Trier focuses on the importance of this actor, this character, while having fun lampooning method acting – notably when the Actor-Boss must 'get in touch with his character' to decide what to do. It's a credit to Von Trier that a silly device can amuse and also build tension.

#13 From the IMDb message-board…
- Here is the synopsis of the movie:
"My Man The President is a comedy: the owner of an IT firm wants to sell up. The trouble is that when he started his firm he invented a nonexistent company president to hide behind when unpopular steps needed taking. When potential purchasers insist on negotiating with the "president" face to face the owner has to take on a failed actor to play the part. The actor suddenly discovers he is a pawn in a game that goes on to sorely test his (lack of) moral fibre." 
- Its actually a Dogme-comedy i’ve heard

#14 Explanation
This "review" (ha ha), with the exception of this section (#14) was compiled, smart-alec style, from other internet resources. The ordering of the sections was decided "by computer"…  Though this is not a conventional, proper "review", you will note that I give the film seven out of a possible ten!

#11 From the IMDb message-board…
- It translates to "the directer of it all". But in Danish it can't mean a ^movie^ director, only business director. :) Seems important to mention. 
- Actually, there could be an ambigous meaning of the title.  The primary meaning must be "The Managing director of it all". It's hard to translate, but picture yourself going into a large warehouse, being mad at a shop assistant and then saying: "I want to talk to guy who is in charge of this place" = that's the first one. The code word is really the word "for" as in English. The other meaning is: "The managing director who is for/in favour of everything" 

#7 London Film Festival patrons comment…
2006-11-03 – Posted by Sebastien
A very good comedy around manipulation. This film is another proof that the scenario, the dialogs and the actors are at the centre of the work of Lars von Trier. We can feel a remembrance of the French New Wave in Lars von Trier's films who plays with the audience to show us how easy we can be manipulated by images. To use manipulation to make the audience aware of the risks to be manipulated by cinema is the whole contradiction and interest of Lars von Trier's films.

#4 Time Out magazine (Dave Calhoun) on The Boss of It All's premiere…
This movie is  'not worth a moment's reflection', he explains, and is meant only to provoke  'a jolly old time'. It unfolds almost entirely within the soulless offices of an undetermined company. Its boss, Ravn (Peter Gantzler) is in a pickle. He wants to sell his company to a gruff Icelander, Finnur (Fridrik Thor Fridriksson), but for the past few years he has been manipulating his employees with recourse to a fictional  'boss of it all', a non-existent ûber-boss who lives in America. In order to secure the sale of his company, Ravn hires a dopey actor, Kristoffer (Jens Albinus) to play the part of the boss.

#1 IMDb synopsis…
The owner of an IT firm wants to sell up. The trouble is that when he started his firm he invented a nonexistent company president to hide behind when unpopular steps needed taking. When potential purchasers insist on negotiating with the "Boss" face to face the owner has to take on a failed actor to play the part. The actor suddenly discovers he is a pawn in a game that goes on to sorely test his (lack of) moral fibre.

#6 London Film Festival catalogue…
In an effort to spend more of his time making films, and fed up with the demands of international publicity, von Trier also decided to limit the international exposure of his films at festivals and events. It is therefore a great pleasure that we have been granted one of the few festival screenings of his new comedy The Boss of it All for this, our 50th celebratory edition.

Automacritic ©

nb : timing is from film-festival catalogue.

seen at Kosmos (public show; complimentary ticket).