Bob Stannard

Another Danish masterpiece. A well-crafted script and an up-close and personal journey into the disturbing world of Asger, a Police Officer at an emergency call centre. As this well-subtitled movie unfolds, with the camera never leaving him during its 1hr 25min running time, we realise he has been stood down from his formal role on the beat and that a backstory may lurk in the motives of his responses to a desperate woman’s kidnapping call. But, all is not as it first seems - either to him or to us, as we too become emotionally involved as each desperate call is made, and he mistakenly takes it upon himself to go beyond his official remit. This is a movie that certainly proves how Emergency Service personnel must remain dispassionate, yet cope with the tricks of morality and acts of human instinct that they have been faced with at the end of a harrowing shift. Particularly if it leaves them feeling as drained as I did at the end of this brilliantly directed and solo-acted emotional cesspool of a movie. Don’t miss it!

Although, on paper, this looks to be a potentially bland and unlikely set-up for a thriller, this grisly and emotionally-charged tale unfolds with skilful and logical plot twists - to a point where all that has gone before makes thought-provoking sense in its disturbing closing episodes that complete this gruesome jigsaw of lies and deceit. It made me think of a French style of “Seven”, with the Wrath, Lust and Envy that permeates, but there the similarity ends.