Kim Voynar from Movie City News writes:
I can’t think of the last time I saw a film about teenagers in which the female protagonist does not flirt with boys, talk about boys, obsess about boys, dress to attract the attention of boys, or engage in rivalry with another girl over a boy. Can you?
Swedish film A Thousand Times Stronger, directed by Peter Schildt, breaks the mold by delving into issues of gender disparity and the silencing of female voices with a story about a how a Swedish school’s gender-divided status quo is shaken up by the arrival of a new girl who’s been schooled all over the world.
The film, interestingly, is narrated by one of its least vocal characters, 15-year-old Signe, who’s one of those quiet good girls who never makes trouble, never makes bad grades … and never gets noticed by her teachers or her peers. While Signe doesn’t speak up about the gender inequalities that bombard her, she thinks about them plenty, and giving her the role of narrator allows us to hear the perspective of the many quiet, obedient good girls who churn along through a school system that largely ignores and devalues them.
When first we meet Signe, she walks us through the school where she’s spent her entire education, giving us her running commentary on things as they are: These are the cool girls, Mimi and her clique. All they think about is fashion and boys and being popular; being smart is not “cool” if you’re a girl, so Mimi and her friends, even though they aren’t stupid, act as though they’re dumber than the boys so they will be liked.
And we have the cool boys; their role is to judge the girls as pretty or not, acceptable or not, to slough off any undesirable work onto the less popular, quiet girls, and to ensure they are the focal point of attention from their teachers, the girls, and even the female cafeteria workers.
The leader of the pack, Ludde (Mimi’s sometime boyfriend) is a natural born charmer who can talk his way out of anything with a flirty smile and a laugh — a future politician, perhaps? Observing a group of younger girls playing cooperatively, Signe wistfully notes that it wasn’t always this way, that when they were younger they were bold and brave and friendly with each other; now that the teen years are upon them, though, the social order of things has shifted.
The boys sit in judgment of the girls, who array themselves in fine feathers and bright makeup to get their attention. The boys, for their part, garner the girls’ attention both by judging them daily for their physical appearance and by jostling with each other for dominance. The teachers are vaguely aware of the disparity in the school’s social order and complicit in its institution, but shrug it off or half-heartedly attempt to talk to the girls about it — in a way that blames the girls for not speaking up more, and for “allowing” the boys to dominate them. Makes you wonder what they’d say to a victim of date rape.
And then a new girl, Saga, arrives — and everything changes.
Saga is different. She doesn’t wear makeup, or dress to please the boys. She wears whatever suits her, whatever is comfortable. Her hair is casually pulled back or loosely piled on her head. She walks with a confident stride, looks everyone clearly in the eye, stands her ground, speaks up.
She’s utterly guileless — not only does she not follow the unspoken rules of social interaction among the older students, she simply ignores the social order altogether. Because she refuses to accept that “the rules” have any power over her, they don’t. She is what she is, she does what she does, and if she’s not afraid to say to her simpering art teacher, “No, I won’t clean up the boys’ mess. Make them clean it themselves.”
She’s friendly to everyone, a friend to all, regardless of clique or social status. Even Mimi isn’t sure how to handle Saga. She confronts Saga at her locker one day and tries to explain to the new girl how things “are” — that she, Mimi, is the popular girl around here, and if Saga wants to be her friend, she can’t be friends with the “other” girls. Saga responds by blithely telling Mimi she’s everybody’s friend, and that’s the way it is, leaving Mimi, jaw agape, to ponder this turn of events and what it means to her own social status.
Saga’s (male) homeroom teacher takes her aside shortly after her arrival at the school and asks her to help empower the girls, to show them how to speak up and not allow the boys to walk all over them. Saga takes this request to heart. And so the girls begin to stand up for their rights, to raise their voices, to point out inequalities and challenge assumptions and say “No.” And guess what? The boys don’t like it. And neither do the teachers.
The characters, other than Saga, are drawn a little blandly and one-dimensionally, and it would have been nice to have a little more showing rather than narrating to give us a better feel for the relationships among the students when they were younger, and how that changed over time. But the young actors do a fine job, and they’re nicely supported by a solid adult cast.
This is the kind of movie for teens I wish you could get made in the United States. A movie where the focus is on girls taking action, girls empowering themselves, girls advocating for change, girls whose lives and thoughts don’t revolve solely around boys, girls who are active protagonists of their own stories, rather than sidebars to stories about boys.
Unfortunately, if A Thousand Times Stronger got remade by an American studio, they’d rename it something like “GirlPower!” (which lends itself really well to the sequels, GirlPower 2! and GirlPower 3D!, not to mention the merchandising!) and cast some Disney or Nickelodeon chicks as Signe and Saga. If Disney did it, they’d get Kenny Ortega to direct it and add some catchy songs and nifty group dance scenes. And Mimi and Saga would fight over Ludde, of course, because there has to be romance and cute boys to squeal over, right? That’s what teen girls really want.
Sigh.
I’d love for someone to prove me wrong, and make an American film for the teen market with no love interest angle at all . But I’m not holding my breath.
P.S. Psssst. Geena Davis, who’s been a strong voice on gender issues for a while now, would be a great lead to produce or direct a project that espouses the values her foundation supports. Pass it on.
Examiner.Com writes:
A Thousand Times Stronger is a new youth film soon on its way to San Francisco, based on a novel by Christina Herrström and directed by Peter Schildt. The film is exceptional on many levels by calling attention to gender inequality in high school from top to bottom. This engaging film will certainly enjoy international currency.
A young Swedish girl who has lived most of her life abroad in Kenya, Barbados and Cuba shows up on campus one day - tall, stately, enthusiastic, considerate and smart. She has heard good things about the Swedish school system and is ready to learn. Right off the bat Saga (Julia Sporre) becomes popular with both girls and boys, giving them all equal attention. Her teacher who everyone calls "Olle" (Jacob Ericksson) eventually singles her out for setting a good example for the girls. This does not meet well with her. It is clear that this teacher allows boys to speak out of turn, but then tries to huddle with the girls to see if this bothers them in private after school sessions. No one speaks up. This is a case of “don't watch what I do, listen to what I say”, and Saga sees through it.
Saga also doesn’t fall for the usual traps that zap the energy of young girls, having an exclusive best friend, giving classmates different ranks based on superficial criteria, forming cliques, spending money on makeup and stylish clothes and trying to impresss the boys. Saga, beautifully played by Julia Sporrewith every earmark of becoming a major Swedish actor, starts to stick up for herself by first answering out of turn and refusing to clean up the boys' mess in art class. She clearly reacts to a long-standing and well-entrenched system of covert gender hierarchy in school. There are no names for boys who speak out of turn and leave a mess. But for girls there are many. First, "fundamentalist feminist", one of the most misused and vacuous labels to come out of postfeminism. Then the verbal attacks drop to a lower level of four or five letter derogatory names for girls. The films shows how language is used to disarm and disempower girls at an early age.
Before Saga has to eventually pay for her outspokenness, the girls in her class ally with her, until the principal tells them there will be no class trip or dance if they continue to rock the boat. The teachers accuse the girls of having behavior problems and causing malicious class disruption. No one seems to better understand the system that perpetuates gender discrimination, except Saga who acts in accordance with what she believes. Watch what she does, AND what she says. They match.
Eventually there is a showdown and students have to make choices. For the spectator it is obvious that there are different standards for boys and girls reinforced by the teachers and administration. But in truth the aim of equality and respect for all is robbed of meaning since one brave young woman raised in non Western countries is singled out as a troublemaker.
A Thousand Times Stronger is told from the perspective of an extremely shy student, Signe (Judit Weegar) who is known primarily through voiceover when she isn't trying to formulate her words. The film shows what can happen to a school system when girls have a say so. It is inspiring to see the gym class where boys buddy up within an inner circle yield to dance lessons for all, or creative approaches to global problems. It’s a utopia that gets to shine for a while, and it should not be taken as a defeat that it doesn’t stay that way forever. It is better to examine the system and why it is so unhealthy. Until the obstinate teacher Olle decides to ally with the boys, everyone seems to benefit. But the girls never get the credit due and the teachers and boys reap the rewards.
Julia Sporre is the outstanding centerpiece of a brilliant youth film supported by a group of talented young actors (Happy Jankell, Hjalmar Ekström, Katharina Cohen, Göran Ragnerstam). It is amusing that the only wooden performances come from the teachers who are supposed to inspire and prepare youth for the future. The students have no real recourse other than to follow their cues and mores but Saga makes a difference in standing the entire system on its head.