THE COMMUNE (KOLLEKTIVET) World Cinema

Director Thomas Vinterberg returns to AFI FEST with his most personal film yet. Basking in the warm glow of Denmark in the 1970s, Erik and Anne are young people struggling to get by and raise their new family. When they fall in love with the enormous vintage home where Erik grew up, they hatch a unique plan to live there as a collective with some friends and strangers. This new strain on the marriage, however, produces fissures that shatter the family unit to its core. Returning to the energetic ensemble style of his 1998 breakout hit THE CELEBRATION, Vinterberg orchestrates a brilliant cast (including Ulrich Thomsen, Berlin Silver Bear Best Actress winner Trine Dyrholm and Martha Sofie Wallstrøm Hansen) in a tale of warmth, chaos, humor and emotionally resonant melodrama. Most movingly, at the film’s heart are a couple anticipating their own demise, in a house where so much space can drive two people in love apart. — Lane Kneedler