Serafima Serafimova
“No doubt about it, films must be cut”, Alfred Hitchcock allegedly declared after experimenting with ‘continuous action’ in his 1948 film Rope. But 75 years after condemning the technique as an artistic dead end, countless single-take films, both feature-length (Son of Saul, Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance), 1917) and short form (At The End Of The Cul-De-Sac, Thunder Road, How to say I Love You at Night) have proven him wrong time and time again. And whilst many criticise the validity of the unbroken shot (most of the noteworthy films do indeed contain cleverly concealed cuts due to technical and logistical limitations), it’s the effect of the illusion that the continuously unfolding narrative has on the audience that matters. Because when it’s done right, as is the case in Kasper & Sophie, the result can be electrifying.
Directed by Tomas Jonsgården, Kasper & Sophie is a simple but powerful coming-of-age story made all the more hard-hitting for the fact that it’s based on a real crime of passion that took place in Stockholm a few years before the short was made. In contrast to the simplicity of the story, the execution, consisting of just three shots invisibly spliced together, must have presented the crew and actors with a challenge of headache-inducing proportions. But their efforts have paid off as this marriage of form and narrative gives the 12-minute drama both a sense of urgency and tension, and makes the experience of watching it so immersive that it feels incriminating – like witnessing a terrible crime and doing nothing to stop it from happening.
Vilmer Björkman puts in an unsettling performance as young Kasper.
The film follows Kasper – a guilt-ridden teenager willing to do whatever it takes to make things right again with his girlfriend. When we are first introduced to the young protagonist, he’s sitting at the dinner table with his parents, deep in thought, an untouched plate of food in front of him. We follow closely as he makes his excuses and goes to his room, puts a few items in his rucksack and goes out. The backstory that has led to this momentous day, is pieced together through a series of phone conversations between him and his girlfriend that play out over the footage, alluding to what happened between the young couple and a girl called Sophie. Kasper & Sophie is a quietly provocative story about betrayal that raises the question of how far one is willing to go for love.
The love triangle at the heart of the film is one we’ve all seen and read about countless times before, and can even be mistaken for a modern-day version of a Shakespearean tragedy. But the fact that the film was based on a real crime instead, makes it far more heartbreaking and difficult to watch whilst the illusion of the unbroken cut forces us to experience it from a different point of view and in an entirely new way.
Jonsgården’s decision to have the narrative unfold continuously over the course of one late afternoon without any jumps in time or location, places the viewer right inside the action, but also inside Kasper’s troubled mind. The camera doesn’t just follow the story and the lead character, it ebbs and flows and pulls us along for the ride, keeping a firm grip on our attention and never allowing any distracted wandering, creating a disquieting experience at almost smouldering proximity. Because seeing how a single misjudged decision can change people’s lives forever is a sobering reminder of just how fleeting life is and how fragile we are.