IT'S a classic dramatic set-up: assemble a collection of contrasting characters in a confined environment and let the sparks – hopefully entertaining ones – start to fly.
The Commune reunites writer Tobias Lindholm (The Hunt, A Hijacking) with director Thomas Vinterberg for a drama inspired by the latter's experiences growing up in an academic commune.
The setting is a sprawling mansion in the middle-class suburbs of early 1970s Copenhagen, in which the film plays out its affecting exploration of the conflict between the era's liberated social and sexual values and its characters' selfish human wants.
The story gets under way as successful professor of architecture Erik (Ulrich Thomsen) and his glamorous TV newscaster wife Anna (Trine Dyrholm) decide to spice up their increasingly predictable middle-aged existence by transforming Erik's newly inherited childhood home into a democratically run collective.
While this occasionally hilarious film is certainly entertaining thanks to Lindholm's deftly crafted dialogue, a dynamite ensemble cast, spot-on period detail and Vinterberg's un-fussy yet stylish direction, there's no denying that The Commune also becomes increasingly heavy going as events unfold.
Certain individuals within the collective begin to crumble once they realise the new free and easy lifestyle they have signed up for may actually end up costing them their happiness and/or sanity.
There are more than a couple of heart-rending scenes and sensitive viewers should probably be prepared to suffer an existential crisis upon leaving the cinema.
Seeds of potential discontent are sown from the outset: Erik initially wants to sell the house, insisting it's too big for the couple and their teenage daughter Freja (Martha Sofie Wallstrom Hansen).
However, Anna declares that "living in a small place makes you small minded" before casually informing her other half that she's growing bored with him and maybe could do with a few new faces/voices about the place.
"I've already heard everything you have to say," she says.
Erik, a quick-tempered man who once became so enraged during a visit to the local swimming pool that he actually fainted, displays remarkable restraint in the face of such barefaced cheek.
Thus, the family have soon recruited Erik's oddball, pyromaniacal friend Ole (Lars Ranthe), their sexually liberated chum Mona (Julie Agnete Vang) and depressive Frenchman Allon (Fares Fares) into their hippy fold, along with a young couple and their cute, seriously ill six-year-old son, Vilads (Sebastian Gronnegaard Milbrat) – a girl-mad moppet with a heart condition who favours the tragic chat-up line "I'm only going to live to be nine".
Cue the 'good times' montage of joyous party scenes, excitable en masse excursions and skinny dipping.
Of course, before too long there are petty squabbles and personality clashes as the cohabitees become confident enough to assert themselves – however, the dysfunction of the actual collective quickly takes a backseat to Erik and Anna's escalating martial problems in proceedings, which begin to poison the atmosphere in their supposedly liberated home.
The Commune's central message seems to be 'be careful what you wish for', with Lindholm and Vinterberg repeatedly hoisting one character in particular on their own petard in a quite sadistic, heartbreaking manner.
While it might be styled as a study of the last days of 'the love era' prior to the onset of consumption and ego-driven 1980s selfishness, The Commune is really about the evolving nature of monogamous romantic relationships and the cruelty partners inflict on one another when they begin to feel trapped.
Its tag line "living together can drive us apart" undoubtedly refers to Erik and Anna as a couple as much as the colourful characters with whom they make their disastrous attempt at creating a new, liberated way of life.
:: Screening now at QFT Belfast; see Queensfilmtheatre.com for tickets and times.
THE COMMUNE (Kollektivet) (15, 111mins), Drama. Trine Dyrholm, Ulrich Thomsen, Helene Reingaard Neumann, Lars Ranthe, Fares Fares. Director: Thomas Vinterberg
RATING: THREE STARS
