Rii
Rear Admiral
I've been on something of a Moodysson kick recently, and as much as I love Fucking Amal and Tillsammans, Lilja 4-ever is, to my mind, clearly his best work. +2 points for setting the intro to Rammstein. 
I'm not exactly the most sophisticated viewer around. For films with even a shred of depth, I often enjoy reading the thoughts of those more perceptive and articulate than I; even if only to clarify and structure my own thoughts.
So I'm surprised that in reading about Lilja 4-ever, it seems to me that a great many people are simply missing large parts of the film. Apparently it's about sex trafficking; and sure, it is, but that's not nearly the whole story. And if it was, it wouldn't be nearly the film that it is.
On a purely structural level, sex trafficking doesn't even enter the picture until the last third of the film. Sure, everyone likes a little character background, but two-thirds of the film? Further, the film's most significant character behind Lilja herself, Volodya, is near-irrelevant in this context.
So what is it that people are missing here? There are, I think, two very revealing scenes. As an angel, Lilja relives certain moments from earlier in the film, amongst these her encounter with the old woman who spilled her potatoes on the stairs. The first time around she mocks and curses the woman on her way out; as an angel she stops to help pick them up.
This is hardly Lilja's only bout of less-than-angelic behaviour: consider her mocking call to Natasha, her instant dismissal of the old man living next to her Aunt's place, her ignoring of the shopkeeper's request to replace an item where she found it. Most significantly, consider that Lilja abandoned Volodya in exactly the same way as she was herself abandoned by her mother. Can anyone doubt that had life in Sweden with Andrei turned out to be paradise that she would've forgotten all about him?
Do we condemn her for these things? Of course not; her suffering is profound and she only human. And yet it is significant that upon reaching the nadir of her own life and committing suicide, that Lilja takes the opportunity to revisit that moment on the stairs.
In this light, consider also that heartbreaking scene (I cried) wherein Lilya drapes a cloth over the table and crawls under it, attempting to recreate the pathetic 'hut' that she and Volodya shared earlier in the film. At the time, Lilya enjoys a greater level of material comfort than ever before, and yet she's unhappier than ever. The obvious reason for this is that she's an unwilling prostitute. And yet, she's been a prostitute before. She's also been raped, but that happened before too. 'Trouble' comes only when she resists, and there appears to be no material reason for her to do so. Indeed, this is likely how Andrei and her handler rationalise their actions to themselves.
So why is she unhappy? The American answer is that it's because she lacks freedom; but that's too easy. I suggest that it has far more to do with the fact that she was betrayed by Andrei, that she's discovered that paradise (Sweden) is anything but: cruel and uncaring people still abound as they did 'somewhere in the former Soviet Union', and the realisation that she has lost the one person who truly cared for her. Hence, 'the hut'.
Through these and other scenes, the film conveys several interrelated ideas: that material comfort, whatever else it can provide, can't provide happiness; that each of us has the ability to affect one another for good or ill, and that happiness is found in sharing with and acting kindly toward one another; that it is relationships between people that matter: why does Volodya continue to carry around the basketball after it has been rendered useless by his father's rage? Further, that whilst apathy towards those distant from us adds to the suffering in this world, that evil lurks 'here' as much as it does 'there'. Recall Lilja's judgement of Sweden: "... and this world isn't very good."
And it's about sex trafficking.
I'm not exactly the most sophisticated viewer around. For films with even a shred of depth, I often enjoy reading the thoughts of those more perceptive and articulate than I; even if only to clarify and structure my own thoughts.
So I'm surprised that in reading about Lilja 4-ever, it seems to me that a great many people are simply missing large parts of the film. Apparently it's about sex trafficking; and sure, it is, but that's not nearly the whole story. And if it was, it wouldn't be nearly the film that it is.
On a purely structural level, sex trafficking doesn't even enter the picture until the last third of the film. Sure, everyone likes a little character background, but two-thirds of the film? Further, the film's most significant character behind Lilja herself, Volodya, is near-irrelevant in this context.
So what is it that people are missing here? There are, I think, two very revealing scenes. As an angel, Lilja relives certain moments from earlier in the film, amongst these her encounter with the old woman who spilled her potatoes on the stairs. The first time around she mocks and curses the woman on her way out; as an angel she stops to help pick them up.
This is hardly Lilja's only bout of less-than-angelic behaviour: consider her mocking call to Natasha, her instant dismissal of the old man living next to her Aunt's place, her ignoring of the shopkeeper's request to replace an item where she found it. Most significantly, consider that Lilja abandoned Volodya in exactly the same way as she was herself abandoned by her mother. Can anyone doubt that had life in Sweden with Andrei turned out to be paradise that she would've forgotten all about him?
Do we condemn her for these things? Of course not; her suffering is profound and she only human. And yet it is significant that upon reaching the nadir of her own life and committing suicide, that Lilja takes the opportunity to revisit that moment on the stairs.
In this light, consider also that heartbreaking scene (I cried) wherein Lilya drapes a cloth over the table and crawls under it, attempting to recreate the pathetic 'hut' that she and Volodya shared earlier in the film. At the time, Lilya enjoys a greater level of material comfort than ever before, and yet she's unhappier than ever. The obvious reason for this is that she's an unwilling prostitute. And yet, she's been a prostitute before. She's also been raped, but that happened before too. 'Trouble' comes only when she resists, and there appears to be no material reason for her to do so. Indeed, this is likely how Andrei and her handler rationalise their actions to themselves.
So why is she unhappy? The American answer is that it's because she lacks freedom; but that's too easy. I suggest that it has far more to do with the fact that she was betrayed by Andrei, that she's discovered that paradise (Sweden) is anything but: cruel and uncaring people still abound as they did 'somewhere in the former Soviet Union', and the realisation that she has lost the one person who truly cared for her. Hence, 'the hut'.
Through these and other scenes, the film conveys several interrelated ideas: that material comfort, whatever else it can provide, can't provide happiness; that each of us has the ability to affect one another for good or ill, and that happiness is found in sharing with and acting kindly toward one another; that it is relationships between people that matter: why does Volodya continue to carry around the basketball after it has been rendered useless by his father's rage? Further, that whilst apathy towards those distant from us adds to the suffering in this world, that evil lurks 'here' as much as it does 'there'. Recall Lilja's judgement of Sweden: "... and this world isn't very good."
And it's about sex trafficking.
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