Together

Lukas Moodysson
2000

Before he made bleak films about preteen Russian prostitutes and desperate amateur pornographers, Lukas Moodysson made this much warmer, much fuzzier picture about a battered mother and her two children taking shelter in a hippy commune run by her brother. The colorful cast of social misfits and radicals include a self-proclaimed lesbian, her bitter ex-husband, their amusingly named child (Tet), a homosexual with a Prince Valiant 'do, an overly serious Marxist, a couple of die-hard crunchies, and gentle leader Goran, who provides a perpetual doormat for his sexually adventurous girlfriend. Visually, Moodysson employs a curious device where nearly every shot of the quasi-documentary camerawork involves a zoom. This aesthetic choice isn't nearly as dreadful as it sounds, lending additional quirk to an already uncommon picture. The abusive husband is given a fair shake, and despite his alcohol fueled fuck-ups, is presented as a three dimensional individual worthy of sympathy. While the mother begins to seriously enjoy her consciousness-expanding time at the commune, cozying up with her new lesbian pal, the children miss eating meat and loathe being driven to school in the stereotypically painted VW bus. There's a lot of great situational humor in the character interactions, starting with a bang when the camera reveals that one of the women is naked from the waist down during a house discussion about dishwashing (fungal infections are a bitch). The film's conflicts tend to wrap up a little too easily, but this remains an extremely pleasant and satisfying picture.