You know you're in for something special from the moment the security guard literally kicks off the most impressive title credit sequence I have ever seen, for what must be the coolest German flick of the 90s.

Lola, our flame-haired heroine, has just received a call from her distraught boyfriend, Manni, telling her she's got 20 minutes to recover a load of misplaced money, and get it to him to avoid his untimely death by gangster. She takes a moment to assess her options, and starts to run. The movie doesn't really let up from there on in.

If you saw Tom Tykwer's Wintersleeper, one of the coolest German films of recent years, and pondered the "what ifs" presented by the chance encounters of the plot, Lola makes it easier. We get to see the whole blood-pounding 20 minutes played three times, each time presenting us with differing "what ifs", as Lola encounters the same characters at different times in her journey to save Manni's life. Each segment sports a different resolution too as the differing timelines & encounters offer differing opportunities to test Lola's ingenuity and resourcefulness.

The movie plays in several different formats, film, video, even snatches of cartoon. The soundtrack, vocals by Potente herself, is.... Gee, I don't really know what you call it :-) techno?? The kind of stuff they pump out of nightclubs these days, that people take drugs like ecstasy & fantasy to.... Anyway, it rocks.

To underline the "what if" theme, we're shown the entire lifetimes' of many of the people Lola encounters along the way, in short snaps of highlights (and lowlights). These can differ markedly from one segment to the next, the only difference being for instance, whether they were knocked over, or successfully dodged by our heroine.

Aside from the 20 minute sprints, played pretty much in real time, the three segments are interspersed with scenes of Lola & Manni in bed. Their pillow talk provides a little breathing space between the main pieces, and they're surprisingly affectionate. Truth to tell, in the main segments, Manni comes across like an idiot. It's in the bits between that we can understand what a spunky chick like Lola sees in him.

Run Lola Run is a hyperkinetic movie, with a pulsing score. I swear, you'll be exhausted at the end, as if you'd been running flat out for 80 minutes yourself. It'd be fair to say you've probably seen nothing like this before, it's kind of unique.

For those who care, Potente has since turned up in Blow, with Johnny Depp & Penelope Cruz, and she's due on our screens again soon in Tykwer's latest movie, The Princess & the Warrior. I don't know much about this movie, but on the strength of Lola, I'm not about to try & guess which part Potente plays.

Fucking Amal
Sweden/Denmark, 1998
Director/Screenwriter: Lukas Moodysson
With: Rebecca Liljeberg, Alexandra Dahlstrom
Running time: 1 hour 29 minutes

First things first, before anyone gets the wrong idea, Amal is the name of the town. Now you get the picture? To make it plainer, this is NOT Swedish porn.

This film has been something of a source of embarrassment for me though.... I first saw it at the Wellington Film Festival a few years back. And I was so impressed that last year I borrowed the demo video from the nice film fest folk to watch it at home with those members of the family old enough not to worry overly about the title and themes. The tape had to be retrieved from some other nice folk who organised a Gay & Lesbian Film Festival in town. These folk agreed to drop it off at my work. It hadn't occurred to me that it wouldn't be in an envelope, so I was somewhat non-plussed to get a terse message from our receptionist telling me a tape had been left there for me.... I tell you, I had stern looks directed at me for months - not just from the receptionist, but all the PAs in the company too. I guess I'm down as a purveyor of dodgy Swedish movies.

So far so good. Problem was, after viewing it again to great family acclaim, I left it by the back door so it was ready to return to its owners. Several weeks later I realised I hadn't returned it & I hadn't actually seen it for a while. So I asked my partner, the lovely T, if she'd put it someplace.... "I think I returned it for you..." was the response. "To where?" I asked. "The video store!"

EEK!!... so off I go down to the video store. "Um... was a video dropped in a few weeks back that didn't belong to you?", "Maybe", they said, "What's it called?". "Er... Fucking Amal...." It wasn't there. But now THEY think I'm some sort of purveyor of dodgy Swedish movies. And they rang around all their branches giving my name & the name of the movie....

The damned thing never turned up... babysitters & cleaners were all interrogated.... So now THEY all think etc... It's a small consolation that whoever scored it - if it was scored for dodgy viewing purposes - will be sorely disappointed. But anyway, what do you care... I'm a purveyor of dodgy Swedish movies....

Like Run Lola Run, Fucking Amal deals with the big "What If" questions. Like, what if, in the very first episode of Beverly Hills 90210, new kids in town Brandon AND Brenda had the hots for Kelly (let's face it, we've all asked this question, right?).

Except that this is Sweden, the kids look their age, and they can act.

This is also very funny, and utterly charming. Bringing back those awful teenage angsty moments like waiting by the telephone for that someone to call. What makes Fucking Amal wickedly funny, is who is waiting for exactly whom, to call.

New girl in town, and rumoured lesbian Agnes - she's actually been there two years, but has made no friends - has the hots for the blonde, popular Elin. Not wanting to spoil the movie for you, let me just say that a series of events conspire to bring Elin & her older sister Jessica to the abortive birthday party that Elin's well meaning parents have held for her. The scene is set for the popular girls to humiliate the school lesbian good, when Jessica dares Elin to kiss Agnes on the mouth...

Throw in Jessica's airhead boyfriend Markus, Elin's other suitor, the infatuated jock, Johan, and a bunch of super-catty in-girls, and we've got a story about love, hope, humiliation, remorse and joy that features one of the most uplifting pay-off scenes you could possibly hope for. Suffice to say this is a feel-good movie, where all the loose-ends are tied up neatly, and everyone pretty much gets what they want, if not who they want, all to a coolish soundtrack that swells up occasionally to good effect at opportune moments.

Rebecca Liljeberg and Alexandra Dahlstrom, as Agnes & Elin are spot on, and are on the strength of this movie, hugely & rightly, popular in Sweden. It's a bit disconcerting at first though, for those of us brought up on Beverly Hills 90210, or indeed most Hollywood teen movies, to see teenagers played by actual teens.

In the US, and probably other places, this movie goes by the name of Show Me Love. We're made of sterner stuff in NZ (Sex & the City & The Sopranos play prime-time here, uncut, and on free to air TV), but there were times I wish we weren't.

Gripes & accolades can be sent to apllewellyn@yahoo.com

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