Utøya: July 22
Short description
Utøya: July 22 is a Norwegian drama set on the island of Utøya on 22 July 2011. Kaja, a nineteen-year-old attending a summer camp run by the Labour Party's youth league, is spending the day with her younger sister Emilie and their friends when gunshots are heard. The campers learn of a bombing in Oslo but do not yet know that a right-wing extremist has reached the island and opened fire. What follows is roughly seventy-two minutes of the group trying to survive, hide and escape an isolated place, while Kaja searches desperately for Emilie.
Erik Poppe directed the film, working from a screenplay by Anna Bache-Wiig and Siv Rajendram Eliassen. It was Poppe's fourth feature, arriving between The King's Choice and Quisling: The Final Days, and was produced by Finn Gjerdrum and Stein B. Kvae for Paradox Produksjon. Andrea Berntzen plays Kaja, with Aleksander Holmen, Brede Fristad, Elli Rhiannon Müller Osborne, Jenny Svennevig and Ingeborg Enes in supporting roles.
Made for a budget reported at around 22 million dollars, the film earned about 4 million dollars worldwide. Reception has been solid: on IMDb it holds 7.2 out of 10 from roughly 17,000 votes, on TMDB 7.1 out of 10 from 467 votes, and a critics' rating of 7 out of 10 from 49 reviews, so professional and audience assessments sit close together.
What's left behind the scenes
- Some Norwegian film critics refused to attend press screenings of the film, accusing the director of "exploiting a painful topic."
- The events were filmed in one take, without editing cuts.
- Almost the entire film was shot in one take – the viewer sees a continuous 72-minute reconstruction of events. Director Erik Poppe had only 5 days to film everything as he envisioned it, so only one take was shot per day. The take from the 4th day was chosen for the final edit.
- The film is based on real events, but the characters in it are fictional.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
