Quisling: The Final Days
By Paul Caspers
For an historical epic, Erik Poppe’s film about the notorious politician Vidkun Quisling throws a few surprises. First, it assumes the audience has a broad grasp of the facts about Norway’s occupation by Germany during World War II and the Nazi-friendly puppet regime lead by Quisling. The film spans the period between Hitler’s death in April 1945 and Quisling’s execution six months later, but the usual captions with names, dates, places and events to frame the action in a factual timeline are entirely lacking. As a result, the film feels fresh and less didactic than most.
Second, it doesn’t look much like countless other historical films based on fact, Norwegian or other, including Poppe’s own The King’s Choice (Kongens nei, 2016), which covered the start of the same war. Shot on an obviously limited budget, it takes place mostly in interiors (Quisling’s prison cell, two apartments, a courtroom) and makes the most of sparse decor and custom design. But this time, Poppe and his POV Jonas Alarik opted for a wildly subjective ‘look’, with oversaturated green and red dominating the screen, framing Quisling mostly in medium close-up, often at odd angels with unusual lighting. This strategy offsets the realistic tone and focuses attention on the man himself.
Third, and much more interestingly, the film is willing to entertain the notion that Quisling had ‘good’ intentions. There is no historical doubt that he facilitated atrocities in his home country; it is not for nothing that his name is still a contemptuous synonym for traitor in several languages. But his own stated motivation that he chose what he saw as the lesser of two evils between fascism and communism is respected to some degree. He repeats this stance, with conviction, in several variations throughout most of the film, in both lengthy dialogues with the mild-mannered pastor assigned by Oslo’s bishop to guide him towards absolution, and in courtroom monologues. In the former, he’s blustering and dismissive, in the latter defiant to the point of pig-headedness.
There are several retorts to his boasts and evasions throughout, primarily from the pastor, but also from a former friend and a concentration camp survivor who give testimony in court; his Ukrainian wife on the other hand, who witnessed his humanitarian efforts decades earlier, supports him unequivocally. Both the attempt towards a balance of perspectives and the focus on Quisling venting his own thoughts creates a surprisingly nuanced portrait. Far from the monster a more conventional film would have made him to be, he’s strongly implied to have been a highly intelligent and principled man who was driven to extremes by his own ambitions, self-importance and ethical delusions. This would not have much of an impact without an outstandingly rich performance by Gard B. Eidsvold as Quisling. He’s a fêted theater actor/director/producer, but rarely got further than supporting parts in the movies, and truly rises to the occasion in a major starring role.
Occasionally, the film is let down by the dialogue on which it depends. The discussions between the pastor (Anders Danielsen Lie, who plays him as a meek antagonist) and his own highly critical wife are too obviously expository to be convincing, and the writers can’t resist injecting wholly anachronistic one-liners that seem designed for an Oscar nomination rather than as believable conversation: a disgusted Olsen actually says ‘We’re done here’ before walking out on his interlocutor. In spite of such failings, and largely by virtue of Eidsvold’s first-class acting, it works well enough as a valiant attempt at getting to the core of the much-maligned Vidkun Quisling.