Erik Nietzsche: the Early Years, still courtesy SIFF.

I’ll try to do a weekend wrap-up, but here’s a quick review of Erik Nietzsche: the Early Years [siff ^[1]]. I saw it last night at a modestly-attended screening at the Uptown last night and it might be worth your while in today’s afternoon spot. SPOILER ALERT: I can’t really tell if the premise of this is meant to be a secret or if I misread the synopsis and was just really slow to get it until late in the game.

Written by Danish provocateur Lars von Trier, this is the story of how a “basically an open and friendly” dreamer of a film student with an obsession for unstructured nature narratives becomes, well, Lars von Trier. Like the film’s pseudonymed protagonist, its director Jacob Thuesen seems to still be in the phase of his career where openheartedness and fondness for beautiful pictures left him making a gentle comedy rather than slashing the Danish Film school to bloody shreds. Still, there are no shortage of gentle barbs throughout.

Watching wide-eyed Erik turn from a kid whose passion for a fancy piece of film equipment rivals his lust for attractive classmates to the “dark side” of self-promotion and manipulation is made all the more delicious by the fact that it is being narrated by von Trier. Although it all sounds rather grim, the plot is actually fairly light, watchable, and for those more in the know than I, well-stocked with plenty of cinematic jokes and cameos.

screens again Sunday June 8, 4:15 PM (Uptown)