For those who have enjoyed Bent Hamer's earlier films, and his eccentric, odd and unconventional style, often located in a very provencial universe, The Middle Man is away. However, it stumbles, and it's basically because Hamer, and perhaps the producers, probably to better hit the American market, have located this original Norwegian novel based plot to a town in the US Rustbelt. Somewhat similar to how Lasse Hallström, who in the early and best part of his career as a director made a success with playing his stories in genuin Swedish local town environments, Hamer has made his art in even more narrow settings, and this has become a very basic value for the ingenuety. So, when he tries to be more internaionally 'public friendly', and even more so when he simultaneously uses highly regular Scandinavian actors, who don't fit the location with either accent or behavious, it's only weird, pretenciously funny, and a stumble in the wrong direction. Another Norwegian environment would be just perfect, but instead this becomes a stumble in the wrong direction.
Review of The Middle Man
