-”Deep inside me I´m still 12 years old – and I´d like to stay there” the director Stefan Jarl
Original title: Jag är din krigare
Country: Sweden
Genre: Family, drama
Release date: 21 Februari 1997
Director: Stefan Jarl
Writer: Stefan Jarl
Cast:
-Robin Milldoff (the boy Kim)
(23 Oct 1982- +3 July 2007)
-John Belindo (the Indian)
-Jan Malmsjö (Chief of Police)
-Mikael Persbrandt (Hjorth)
-Peter Harryson (Estate Owner)
The coming-of-age film ”Nature´s Warrior” is a Swedish production from 1997 that I think has got too little attention among the broader audience, in spite of the cast which includes some of the most famous actors and media persons you´ll find in Sweden (Jan Malmsjö, Mikael Persbrandt and Peter Harryson). I guess the reason for this is the somewhat low profile cinematography. This is not an action movie, nor a family comedy. It´s not the easiest film you rent from the DVD-store with your family or friends on a friday evening. But, don´t go yet, because what you´ll have here instead is pure quality, with a beautiful photo and excellent performances by both Robin Milldoff, who is playing the boy, and by Mikael Persbrandt, who is one of my favourite adult Swedish actors. The director himself claims that there is an expression that says that you shouldn´t make a film based on children, wild animals or nature if you want to succeed. However, that´s exactly what this film is about!
From the beginning, the 12-year-old boy Kim is biking and playing with his friend like a normal boy. But it´s soon clear that the wild animals around him fascinates him much more than his friend does, who naturally gets tired of him and bikes back home, leaving Kim alone out in the forest. On his way home he has an accident with his bike and ends up in a small lake, all wet. After he manages to get himself up to the road again he meets an indian, dressed up in all the classical utensils, who apparently has watched the accident from a distance. But is there really an indian or is it only a dream? Kim stays that night by the camp fire and the indian tells him that Kim is choosen to protect all the wild animals and fight for nature. It´s a task he at first rather innocently deals with by picking up some garbage other people has left behind, and you´d think he will sooner or later get bored and go home. But then comes the subtle but certain transformation from the ordinary boy to the indian boy, who takes his given task to protect the wild animals deadly serious, and he gets more and more one with nature. He forgets all about his family and friends and gets as wild as the animals he protects.
The boy who plays Kim, Robin Milldoff, died in 2007, only 25 years old, so this review is also a tribute to one of the best Swedish boy actors I´ve seen so far.
Purchase: I bought this DVD at the local DVD-shop in the cinema Zita in Stockholm.
”Deep inside I´m still 12 years old – and I want to stay there. At that time in life, you felt things clearer, you knew so much, and had so great expectations on life. Everything was waiting for you, and anything was possible. And everything was so fun! When you were 12 you also discovered for the first time that you collided with the world of the adults, that there was a difference between your thoughts, who you were, and who you wanted to be – compared to what the adults wanted you to be. When I was younger I was fascinated by indians. It made me discover the secrets of nature. I think I was about 15 years old when I no longer wanted to ”play indians”. ” the director Stefan Jarl
Original title: The Sandlot
