You will feel nothing: The Worst Person in the World reviewed

The Worst Person in the World is a Norwegian film that has made a big splash. To date, its star (Renate Reinsve) has won Best Actress at Cannes and it has been nominated for two Oscars (Best Original Screenplay and Best International Feature Film). It has also attracted rave reviews. I can now only conclude: I must be the Hardest to Please Person in the World as I can’t fathom what all the fuss is about. It’s not atrocious. It’s not Batman. But it’s nothing special. And until I read that it is a ‘romantic comedy’ I hadn’t realised it was a comedy at all. Perhaps I am also afflicted with the Worst Sense of Humour in the World?

This is from writer-director Joachim Trier, who co-authored the screenplay with his regular collaborator Eskil Vogt. The narrative is structured like a book as it’s divided into 12 chapters, with a prologue and epilogue, and it plays episodically. The main character is Julie (Reinsve) who, as the prologue speedily informs us with a series of quick cuts, was a medical student, then a psychology student, but didn’t stick with either. She is now a photographer and about to turn 30. Joanna Hogg’s main character in The Souvenir was called Julie too, as it happens, and this is yet another young-woman-needs-to-find-herself-and-her-voice film. It feels familiar – like something Greta Gerwig has done a hundred times even if she probably hasn’t.

On to the men in Julie’s life. We see her dump one boyfriend, then meet another, Aksel (Anders Danielsen Lie), a graphic artist a decade her senior, and she moves in with him. I wish I could say there isn’t a montage of them falling in love but there is.