Stellan Skarsgård gives a wonderfully weighted and authoritative performance in this otherwise over-familiar Cuckoo's Nest-style drama, pungently played out at a youth prison off the Norwegian coast. He plays Hakon, the foursquare, God-fearing warden, struggling to subdue the antics of a fiery new arrival (Benjamin Helstad) who becomes the poster boy for the cowed other inmates. Robust acting and crisp direction eases the old-rope material through to the inevitable conflagration.

Xan Brooks

Post a review, thought or comment