Do people like this cause its foreign?
I can’t think of any other reason. This movie was terrible.
Bad dubbing. A plot that made no sense. Silly dialogue.
I'm from Denmark and I've liked some of Ole Bornedal's other work and there are a bunch of good actors in this movie as well.
I recently rewatched 'Festen', in which Ulrich Thomsen was great, the same goes for Paprika Steen and Helle Dolleris. In 'Vikaren' Helle Dolleris played the role of the mother of Tobias and she was given no lines. I'll be damned if I can remember who Tobias was though.
For some reason the acting is atrociously bad in this though. I set the bar pretty low when it comes to child actors, as that usually means I won't be disappointed and at times it gives me a pleasant surprise ('Brødre' 2004 where Ulrich Thomsen is great again). I have no idea what went wrong here, but something certainly did. A bunch of (usually) competent actors and an okay director and this is still terrible.
I see that Henrik Prip is credited as a writer alongside Ole Bornedal, but I don't think it's fair to put all the blame on him when he isn't the director.
I obviously didn't watch a dubbed version of this movie, so I can't comment on that point, but I have to agree with everything else you stated, which is a bummer.
I have to add that it seemed like all the characters were writted by a five year old. The school psychologist character was so tedious, I forgot that he was nommed two minutes after it happened.
It wasn't a softer heart they needed in order to avoid extinction. What they needed was a brain or a lesson in basic logic.
Where the fück is Wallace? Huh? String? String? Look at me! Where the fück is Wallace?! HUH?!