The Hunt
Short description
Lucas, a teacher in a small Danish town, is rebuilding his life after a difficult divorce. He has a new job at a kindergarten, a new relationship, and hope of repairing his bond with his teenage son, Marcus. Among the children in his care is Klara, the young daughter of his closest friend, Theo. What Klara says to an adult at the kindergarten, an offhand remark no one takes seriously at first, turns into a rumour that spreads through the community as Christmas approaches. Lucas finds himself accused of something he did not do, and the people around him turn against him while he tries to defend himself.
Thomas Vinterberg directed and co-wrote the film with Tobias Lindholm. It followed The Celebration (1998) and Dear Wendy (2005) in Vinterberg's filmography, and was in turn followed by Far from the Madding Crowd (2015). Mads Mikkelsen leads a cast that includes Thomas Bo Larsen, Annika Wedderkopp, Lasse Fogelstrøm, Susse Wold and Anne Louise Hassing, with 38 credited cast members in all.
Made for roughly 4 million US dollars, the film took about 18 million US dollars worldwide, a strong return on its budget. On IMDb it holds a rating of 8.1 out of 10 from just under 5,000 votes, and its critics' score stands at 7.8 out of 10 from 131 reviews, so audiences and critics alike responded positively.
What's left behind the scenes
- Filming began in December 2011 in the Danish administrative region of Zealand and lasted seven weeks. By the end of the filming process, Winterberg was unsure about the final scene, so he shot several episodes, after which he argued with colleagues for a long time about which one was best.
- The killed dog’s tongue initially sticks out to the left, but when Lucas buries it, it’s sticking out to the right.
- After Lucas hits Theo in the church, Theo's eyes are seen to be blue. That same night, when he enters his daughter Clara's bedroom, it is noticeable that his eyes have returned to normal. And after that, during a meeting with Lucas, they turn blue again.
- According to Vinterberg, he and screenwriter Tobias Lindholm initially imagined the main character as similar to Robert De Niro’s character in “The Deer Hunter.” After Mads Mikkelsen was cast, a “Christian, firmly convinced that people are inherently good and one should behave as civilly as possible” emerged.
- The idea of developing such a project came to Winterberg after the Cannes triumph of "The Celebration." The director began receiving numerous screenplays, primarily family dramas and tragedies. One day, a close acquaintance, a Danish psychologist, appeared on his doorstep. In his archives, he had long kept interesting cases “about fantasies that replace real memories.” He stated that Winterberg absolutely must choose one of them and make a film based on it.
- Following the Cannes triumph of “Another Round,” Thomas Vinterberg began receiving numerous screenplays for family dramas. A psychologist acquaintance also suggested he choose a story from his archive of interesting cases – “fantasies that replace real memories” – and base a film on it.
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