Movie Review for After the Wedding

Summary: Jacob has dedicated his life to helping street kids in India. When the orphanage he's in charge of is under the threat of closure, he receives an unusual offer. A Danish businessman, Jorgen, offers him a donation of $4 million dollars. But there are certain conditions attached. Jacob must come to Denmark. And he must attend the wedding of Jorgen's daughter. The wedding becomes a landmark meeting between past and future and puts Jacob in the dilemma of his life.

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Marcy Dermansky of About.com (7/0)
            Secrets are revealed. Tears are shed. One revelation leads to the next, but never once does the s...

By Philip Martin of Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (7/0)
            ...a highly entertaining film that manages to be brutally honest about human motivation and the c...

By Eleanor Ringel Gillespie of Atlanta Journal-Constitution (7/0)
            Yes, they throw more than rice at this Wedding, but it's all in service of an astutely observed a...

By Eleanor Ringel Gillespie of Atlanta Journal-Constitution (7/0)
            Melodrama and masterful acting mix in this fine Danish film.

By Josh Rosenblatt of Austin Chronicle (7/0)
            Bier [is] the latest in a long line of filmmakers who have mastered the art of making movies abou...

By Stella Papamichael of BBC (7/0)
            This mightn't be as fun as a Big Fat Greek Wedding, but there's at least as many broken plates af...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Ty Burr of Boston Globe (7/0)
            ...a family melodrama of epic proportions.

By Rob Thomas of Capital Times (Madison, WI) (7/0)
            There are certainly some big emotional moments here that vibrate with emotional intensity, but th...

By Jamie Russell of Channel 4 Film (6/1)
            A poignant and intimate drama about revelations that have life-changing impact, Bier's film prove...

By Bill Stamets of Chicago Sun-Times (7/0)
            Sounds like a soap opera. But Danish director Susanne Bier builds a high-minded melodrama from th...

By Michael Phillips of Chicago Tribune (7/0)
            ...a fine, fiercely acted Danish potboiler...

By Pablo Villaca of Cinema em Cena (4/3)
            Uma obra de intensa carga emocional.

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Jeffrey M. Anderson of Combustible Celluloid (7/0)
            [The] handheld, digital camerawork provides an ultra-realistic, immediate feel, but also highligh...

By Michael Booth of Denver Post (7/0)
            You leave the movie feeling exhausted, argumentative and exhilarated, surely the sign of a powerf...

By Robert Denerstein of Denver Rocky Mountain News (7/0)
            Bier's not timid about tossing any number of volatile ingredients into an already-simmering pot.

By Jeff Vice of Deseret News, Salt Lake City (7/0)
            The plotting in After the Wedding is melodramatic, even a bit soap-operatic. Yet, unlike many Hol...

By David Cornelius of eFilmCritic.com (7/0)
            A deeply intimate tale of regret and hope, with characters that will linger in your thoughts.

By Emanuel Levy of EmanuelLevy.Com (7/0)
            This Oscar-nominated melodrama again shows Bier's ability to turn simple character drama into gri...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Patrick Peters of Empire Magazine (7/0)
            The storyline is a highly melodramatic, but some solid performances and the relentless intimacy o...

By Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly (7/0)
            Talented filmmaker Susanne Bier, armed with an outstanding compositional sense, keeps control ove...

By Kam Williams of EURWeb (7/0)
            A paradoxical, if ultimately plausible portrait of a fractured family which deals with baby-daddy...

By Adam Nayman of eye WEEKLY (7/0)
            This melodrama about a miserable Good Samaritan (Mads Mikkelsen) staring down a difficult (and he...

By Erica Abeel of Film Journal International (7/0)
            The film generates such visceral heat, the whole notion of genre becomes irrelevant.

By Jay Antani of filmcritic.com (7/0)
            ...loses all sense of its early poetry...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Jay Antani of filmcritic.com (7/0)
            I hereby declare a moratorium on any such filmmakers entering India in hopes of preventing any fu...

By Eric Lurio of Greenwich Village Gazette (7/0)
            We have Rolf Lassgard chewing the scenery like nobody's business, and Ms. Babett managing to keep...

By Peter Bradshaw of Guardian [UK] (7/0)
            As with many of Bier's films, a certain suspension of disbelief is necessary: but she has a disti...

By Michael Rechtshaffen of Hollywood Reporter (7/0)
            Director Susanne Bier artfully removes the veneers concealing the dark truths locked away by her ...

By Bruce Westbrook of Houston Chronicle (7/0)
            In my book it's high camp -- a thrill ride for emotion junkies.

By Bruce Kirkland of Jam! Movies (7/0)
            If what Bier and veteran co-writer Anders Thomas Jensen created is melodrama, then so is the stuf...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By David Kaplan of Kaplan vs. Kaplan (7/0)
            Director Susanne Bier is obviously fond of extreme close-ups (people smoking, people drinking, pe...

By Jeanne Kaplan of Kaplan vs. Kaplan (7/0)
            A rare treat --- don't miss it!

By Glenn Whipp of Los Angeles Daily News (7/0)
            The filmmakers pile on a heap of life's complications but for all the recriminations, the movie r...

By Kenneth Turan of Los Angeles Times (7/0)
            It's that paradoxical melodrama that point-blank refuses to acknowledge that it's being melodrama...

By Duane Dudek of Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (7/0)
            After the Wedding has a dignity of purpose that is made to feel authentic by the performances.

By Ron Wilkinson of Monsters and Critics (7/0)
            Dark secrets eat away from within, but after 120 minutes of self-loathing this soapy tale fails t...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Ken Hanke of Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC) (7/0)
            A shrewdly constructed narrative and strong lead performances make up for much -- including Bier'...

By David Poland of Movie City News (7/0)
            Every time you think you are going to hit a cliche, the film turns on it.

By Ted Murphy of Murphy's Movie Reviews (7/0)
            On its own terms and apart from the awards hoopla, AFTER THE WEDDING is a decent, if flawed featu...

By Elizabeth Weitzman of New York Daily News (7/0)
            The characters may suffer once the bride walks down the aisle, but [director] Bier, [writer] Jens...

By Andrew Sarris of New York Observer (7/0)
            May be the strangest and most surprising film you’ll see this year, in that its character develop...

By Lou Lumenick of New York Post (7/0)
            ...highly entertaining...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Manohla Dargis of New York Times (7/0)
            ...a modern creation with a classic theme involving haves and have-nots, bloodlines and family ti...

By Jan Stuart of Newsday (7/0)
            Crisply written and acted soap opera from Susanne Bier, but vague in its intentions.

By Frank Swietek of One Guy's Opinion (7/0)
            In less accomplished hands might have been dismissed as mawkish and contrived, but...comes across...

By Noel Murray of Onion AV Club (7/0)
            After The Wedding could be the cinematic equivalent of a Coldplay song. And while that isn't nece...

By Marc Mohan of Oregonian (7/0)
            A serious adult drama that, in the wrong hands, would have certainly been a cloying mess. Instead...

By Roger Moore of Orlando Sentinel (7/0)
            Lovely, dense and surprising.

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By John Thomason of Orlando Weekly (7/0)
            The portent of [director] Bier’s unyielding vision may turn some viewers off, but she has the ext...

By Jeanne Aufmuth of Palo Alto Weekly (7/0)
            Handsome drama that reveals depth beneath its polished veneer.

By Jon Popick of Planet Sick-Boy (7/0)
            Incredibly heart-wrenching, and full of some very, very strong performances

By Cynthia Fuchs of PopMatters (7/0)
            Helene, caught like Jacob between lives, spends much of the film trying to explicate choices that...

By Mark Pfeiffer of Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema (7/0)
            After the Wedding's anguished portrait of family, charity, and mortality peels back layers in the...

By Pam Grady of Reel.com (7/0)
            As in any good melodrama, After the Wedding indulges in its share of tears, but it's also surpris...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Laura Clifford of Reeling Reviews (7/0)
            ...star Mads Mikkelsen is becoming internationally known and while he delivers another fine perfo...

By James Berardinelli of ReelViews (7/0)
            ...hopeful and optimistic.

By Jim Lane of Sacramento News & Review (7/0)
            ...a rare film of conflict without villains.

By Sean Means of Salt Lake Tribune (7/0)
            It's Mikkelsen who anchors the movie, as his moody Jacob tries to reconcile his past mistakes wit...

By Jean Lowerison of San Diego Metropolitan (7/0)
            Who'd have thought a Danish soap opera would be as bad as an American one?

By Mick LaSalle of San Francisco Chronicle (7/0)
            The characters are fascinating and nuanced, and the actors go for broke.

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Mick LaSalle of San Francisco Chronicle (7/0)
            There are no guarantees with this sort of thing, but it really is possible that one or two scenes...

By William Arnold of Seattle Post-Intelligencer (7/0)
            ...a highly original and unusually powerful drama...

By Moira MacDonald of Seattle Times (7/0)
            [Director] Bier's careful touch and the skill of the cast make After the Wedding an emotional and...

By Ed Gonzalez of Slant Magazine (7/0)
            The wunderkind Jensen's scripts are all schematic and prone to stock characters, but they are soa...

By Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat of Spirituality and Practice (7/0)
            A substantive film about an idealistic Danish aid worker who is forced to stretch his own capacit...

By Angela Baldassarre of Sympatico.ca (7/0)
            "After the Wedding" has the makings of a melodramatic soap opera were it not in the hands of a se...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Richard Schickel of TIME Magazine (7/0)
            It speaks the universal language of high romance in the distinctly unromantic Danish tongue. But ...

By David Jenkins of Time Out (7/0)
            Solid, insightful and supremely well made.

By Tony Medley of tonymedley.com (7/0)
            A cast from paradise, brilliantly directed by Susanne Bier.

By Ken Fox of TV Guide's Movie Guide (7/0)
            A thoughtful exploration of paternity and responsibility. Much of the film's success lies in Bier...

By Matthew Turner of ViewLondon (7/0)
            A superb performance by Mads Mikkelsen and an engaging, sharply written script.

By Desson Thomson of Washington Post (7/0)
            The film brings us face to face with the movie's starkest truth: It's not whether or not we preva...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Daniel M. Kimmel of Worcester Telegram & Gazette (7/0)
            ...a powerful drama about secrets... At times it threatens to veer into soap opera, but the filmm...

By John Beifuss of Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN) (3/5) Login Required (Login Required)
            The odd cropping of the closeups is Bier's way of acknowleding that the slices of life we see ons...

By Chris Hewitt (St. Paul) of St. Paul Pioneer Press (4/5) Login Required (Login Required)
            Just when we start to find these people interesting and credible, the plot tosses us something we...

By Shlomo Schwartzberg of Boxoffice Magazine (3/4) No reference
            Script takes one melodramatic turn too many, ultimately pushing the film’s characters around like...

By J. R. Jones of Chicago Reader (3/4) No reference
            As the premise might suggest, Jensen's dramatic structure is so visible this sometimes seems like...

By Terry Lawson of Detroit Free Press (3/4) No reference
            Mikkelsen, Lassgard, Knudsen and Christensen seem to burrow into the deepest parts of their heart...

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Loey Lockerby of Kansas City Star (3/4) No reference
            After the Wedding is a sad film in many ways, but it’s also surprisingly uplifting. Thanks to [di...

By Rene Rodriguez of Miami Herald (3/4) No reference
            After the Wedding ends up feeling far weightier than it first appears, with its plot contrivances...

By Stephen Whitty of Newark Star-Ledger (3/4) No reference
            A deceptively unadorned movie that ends in huge, untidy and enormously satisfying emotions.

By Jack Garner of Rochester Democrat and Chronicle (3/4) No reference
            A fully engaging drama, with powerful emotional punches and surprises.

By Laura Kelly of South Florida Sun-Sentinel (6/1) No reference
            An emotional masterpiece whose end is impossible to guess.

By David Fear of Time Out New York (6/1) No reference
            Bier’s insistence on adding even more melodramatics into the mix feels like a mistake.

                         Reviews of After the Wedding
By Harvey S. Karten of Compuserve (7/1) Not Reachable
            What could have been a soap soars thanks to a sharp script and magnetic performances.

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IFC Films

Production Companies
Sigma Films
Zentropa Entertainment
Sveriges Television Drama

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