Starring: Mads Mikkelsen, Thomas Bo Larsen, Bjarne Henriksen, Lasse Fogelstrom, Annika Wedderkopp and Susse Wold
Distributor: Madman Entertainment
Runtime: mins. Reviewed in May 2013
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In the last twenty years, awareness of the realities of sexual abuse of minors, individual, in families, in institutions, in the churches, has increased, more than could ever have been anticipated. The Hunt, an excellent film, can be seen in an important and significant context.
But, the consciousness is quite different in different cultures. English-speaking countries were the first to experience this surfacing of issues of abuse with consequent police investigations and court proceedings. In the 1990s, many commentators from countries in continental Europe were in denial about such events in their cultures. They have had to face the problems since. So, it is interesting to see a film from Denmark. While it is an education situation that is dramatized here, it is a secular case, nothing to do with church or church institutions (although it is a Lutheran ceremony that serves as a catalyst for a confrontation, as will be mentioned later).
It can be noted that The Hunt was awarded the prize of the Ecumenical Jury in Cannes 2012.
The focus is on a kindergarten teacher in a small Danish town. He is shown as a popular man with the men, many of whom are literal hunters of deer since venison is a favoured meat. The teacher himself, Lukas, hunts. We see him playing in a lively way and vigorously with the children at the kindergarten (something that would not be permitted in many countries now). He is a good man, an average man, who is lonely after his separation from his bitter wife who allows him to see his son only every other weekend.
Klara, the daughter of his best friend, Theo, is fond of Lukas’ dog and wants to take him for a walk. When her parents quarrel, he takes her to school. One day she kisses him and he tries to tell her that this is not quite right. At the same time, her brother and his friend show her pictures of an erect penis (which we, the audience, see so that we are experiencing our own reactions as well). In a little girl pique, she indicates to the principal that Lukas had exposed himself to her.
The audience knows that Lukas is innocent, so the film-makers invite us to share the experiences of a man who is not only the victim of a little child’s lie, but incurs the wrath of the town who readily believe that a child does not lie. He is demonized and is ostracized, even in the supermarket where we are horrified at the violence and hate in a bashing from people who assume the worst. This is lynch mob mentality in a contemporary setting.
The audience is made to witness the handling of the situation by the kindergarten principal and an expert she calls in. While they are sympathetic and think they are doing the right thing, their questioning is completely unprofessional, asking leading questions, putting ideas and images (especially in naming aspects of male sexual behaviour) in Klara’s mind. While the little girl does hesitate and even contradict herself, it is clear that she has become confused as well as willful, can’t quite remember what she has said and acquiesces in what could become implanted memories.
The only support Lukas gets is from a friend and his family where the father is a lawyer who helps, especially after Lukas is arrested and interrogated by the police. This interrogation is not part of the screenplay. We do not know how the police handled it. By this time, all the children believe that they have been abused – but their memory describes places that do not exist. The other support for Lukas is from his son who is also ill-treated, becoming angry and angrier.
As mentioned earlier, it is a Christmas Eve ceremony in the local Lutheran church, with prayer and the children singing hymns where Lukas is able to confront Theo about his innocence. The Christmas spirit and his conscience touch Theo.
Then, the film seemed to be moving towards a very Hollywood ending, nice, until a final shot jolts Lukas and the audience as well. The experience and the stigma might never go away.
Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen has played many a villain in his local films as well as in international films (like Le Chiffre in Casino Royale). He won the Cannes Best Actor award for this role and, generally quietly, bewildered, then angry at people’s unquestioning hatred, he enables us to share something of what this experience is like, how at times, it seems that he can never escape from it, that his fate is doomed.
Director Thomas Vinterberg is no stranger to these themes. His 1998, Festen has become something of a classic, the audience going into a home to share a feast and celebration only to find the surfacing of the ugliest of secrets, and sexual misconduct, within the family.
The public these days have strong opinions and feelings about sexual abuse, especially towards perpetrators and to authorities who have protected them. Stage government enquiries and the Royal Commission will surface more and more horrendous stories over the coming years. The Hunt is a reminder that, especially with small children, greater care needs to be taken when they tell their stories so that they will be protected but that the truth will come out and anyone wrongly accused will be treated with justice and compassion.
[Indictment: The McMartin Trial is an American film of 1995, well worth seeing. The staff of a child care centre were the targets of some false accusations, the children caught up in sharing each other’s alleged memories, with the danger of psychiatrists not simply surfacing repressed memories but suggesting and implanting memories.]
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