Lines Crossed: The Films of Ruben Östlund
In each of his films, Swedish filmmaker Ruben Östlund displays an almost unhealthy obsession with observing people infringe on each others’ boundaries. From Play to Triangle of Sadness, he has crafted a body of work that breathes gently on the fragile structures of social relations until, like a house of cards, they begin their slow and unavoidable toppling. His style is a meticulously controlled portrayal of chaos, unsentimental yet emotionally raw, surreal situations built on incredibly real performances.
Play (2011) is based on a series of robberies and bullying incidents that occurred in Gothenburg, Sweden between 2006 and 2008.
In Play, Östlund pushes the boundaries of boundary-pushing. It follows a group of boys engaging in psychological games that drag on for hours. What seems at first like an innocent request to borrow a phone gradually devolves into an elaborately layered plot of deception, until one can’t quite discern what’s accidental and what’s deliberately designed.
Östlund’s camera is detached, almost indifferent, usually shooting from a distance, sometimes from behind a barrier, often allowing the subjects to go off camera as a means of diminishing even further their perceived autonomy over their circumstances. This choice forces us to confront our own complicity: are we passive spectators to injustice in our own lives? The lack of music heightens this feeling, leaving us to stew in the awkwardness of prolonged silences and the disquieting sense that the situation could explode at any moment, or worse yet, escalate indefinitely to intolerable levels.
Notably, Östlund uses long takes to emphasize the unease. One scene in particular—a phase of the scam taking place in a tram—is a nearly static shot that feels excruciatingly convincing. Because of the understated tone of the film, it is easy to dismiss scenes like this without fully appreciating how difficult it is to attain this level of realism, especially with young actors. Again the theme of boundaries is examined, as one of the scammers goes on a sidequest to harass another tram passenger, first by asking to listen to what he’s playing in his headphones, and eventually coercing him into playing his hornet out loud for everyone in the tram to hear. This one scene mirrors the greater theme of the film, an observation of a master manipulator at work, and just how willing human beings can be to compromise their own standards out of desperation to bring an uncomfortable situation to an end.
Force Majeure (2014) was nominated for an Academy Award for best foreign-language film.
In Force Majeure, probably Östlund’s most incisive and essential work, a family skiing trip is disrupted early on by an unexpected avalanche scare. Whereas a typical disaster film would focus on the physical obstacles to be overcome to ensure the family’s survival, this film focuses entirely on the psychological repercussions of one split-second decision. Instead of protecting his wife Ebba and children, the father, Tomas, abruptly leaves them behind and shoves his way through the crowd to ensure his own safety. The marital fallout resembles an avalanche of its own, a uneasy trickle at first, slowly snowballing into complete and utter devastation.
The simple, aurally textured portrayal of the majestic snowy mountains, as the family continues their skiing expedition day after day, contrast the outer peace of their surroundings with their increasing turmoil of their inner constructs. In one beautifully delicate scene, Ebba decides to ski on her own for the day, and while she steps into the forest to take a bathroom break, she can hear Tomas and the kids skiing past in a parallel path. They don’t see her, but she can see them through the trees. The camera is static, showing her point of view, as the family passes by, into the frame and out again. But Östlund doesn’t cut away at first. He lingers on the empty frame for a few moments, as if Ebba herself is lost in thought and unable to look away. By the time we cut back to a close-up of her, she is in tears, presumably at the realization that her family itself is fading away. There are no words, and no music. We only hear (but don’t see) the tap of her tears against the snow.
The Square (2017) includes an outstanding performance by actor and stunt double Terry Notary.
In The Square, Östlund turns his lens on the art world, using a high-concept satire to explore themes of trust, elitism, and moral posturing. The titular "Square," an art installation meant to symbolize equality and community, becomes a microcosm of societal contradictions.
Östlund’s mastery of the uncomfortable moment reaches new heights here, in perhaps the most astounding scene of all his films, centered around a performance artist (played by Terry Notary) who embodies a wild animal, terrorizing a room full of affluent art patrons, refusing to break character even for a moment. The scene drags on, to some of the most unbearable levels captured on film, and that’s exactly the point: it confronts us with our threshold for discomfort and our instinct to conform. We’ve all been in public situations where someone seems to be pushing the boundaries of what’s socially acceptable, but no one feels it’s their place to interrupt or moderate - so the situation prolongs, and everyone’s thinking, “when will this stop?” “Please, someone make it stop.” “Why isn’t anyone stopping this?!” Here, Östlund is again obsessed with charting this territory, with bold and daring imagination.
Triangle of Sadness (2022) was nominated for 3 Oscars: Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay.
His latest film, Triangle of Sadness is Östlund’s most ambitious, sprawling work, dissecting class and privilege through three acts: the tense relationship between two young influencers, a disastrous luxury cruise trip, and the most provocative and awkward survival scenario on a deserted island one could imagine. It’s a natural progression of Östlund’s interest in social hierarchies, pushing his themes to their logical (and absurd) extremes. Like in Play, his characters continue to cross lines here, in both small and significant ways. A lady who is a passenger of the cruise decides to invite one of the friendly staff to take a break and join her in the pool. Despite the employee’s polite insistence that it’s against company policy, the passenger eventually manages to convince the staff member to enter the water in full uniform. We can see in the staff member’s face her intense struggle to say “No” as the passenger pressures her with a “customer is always right” guilt trip, eventually succeeding in roping the entire crew into take a quick break for a dip in the pool. This is equivalent to how the hornet player on the tram was coerced into publicly embarrassing himself in Play. How easily are we willing to dissolve our boundaries, and what happens as a result? Östlund is compulsively asking us.
“Art should comfort the disturbed,” said writer Cesar A. Cruz, “and disturb the comfortable.” Across his films, Ruben Östlund fixates on peeling back the layers of civility, thus revealing our universal vulnerability underneath. From the sterile opulence of a pretentious art museum in The Square, to the grotesque spectacle of a luxury cruise gone wrong in Triangle of Sadness, he uses setting as a metaphor for greater societal structures in which to explore the potential absurdity of the human behavior. His omniscient, unblinking camera seriously considers (more than curiously fictionalizes) the moral quandaries inherent in the imposition of control. He thrives on making us squirm in disbelief in order to force reflection. His characters at first hesitate, then willingly participate in carefully constructed situations that push them to reveal their true selves - for better or for worse - but ultimately in function of a kind of ambiguous, almost indiscernible transformation. And that’s a place sometimes people don’t get to, without their circumstances pushing them beyond their limits. Östlund’s prowess at portraying this on camera makes him one of my favorite filmmakers.
