
Another Round (2020)
a.k.a Druk
Director: Thomas Vinterberg
Plot Synopsis[]
Four high school teachers (Mads Mikkelsen, Thomas Bo Larsen, Lars Ranthe, and Magnus Millang) consume alcohol on a daily basis to see how it affects their social and professional lives.
Male Deaths[]
- Thomas Bo Larsen [Tommy]
Female Deaths[]
- None
Trivia[]
- The film was based on a play Thomas Vinterberg had written while working at the Burgtheater in Vienna. Additional inspiration came from Vinterberg's own daughter (Ida), who had told stories of the drinking culture within the Danish youth. Ida had originally pressed Vinterberg to adapt the play into a movie, and was slated to play the daughter of Martin (Mads Mikkelsen). The story was originally "A celebration of alcohol based on the thesis that world history would have been different without alcohol", and according to Vinterberg, it was "a much angrier movie". However, four days into filming, Ida was killed in a car accident. Following the tragedy, Vinterberg stated that he considered to stop making the film, and even considered to "stop living". However, he eventually decided to rework the script to become more life-affirming. "It should not just be about drinking. It was about being awakened to life," stated Vinterberg. Co-writer Tobias Lindholm served as director in the week following the accident. The film was dedicated to Ida, and was partially filmed in her classroom with her classmates.
- Denmark has some of the highest rates of teenage drinking in the world; a World Health Organization report released earlier in 2020 found that Danish 15-year-olds consumed alcohol at nearly double the European average. Recent efforts to raise the minimum age for purchasing alcohol to 18 from 16 have met with resistance, in part because older adults recall their own youthful intoxications so fondly.
- Despite COVID restrictions by opening weekend the film had sold 102,366 tickets, including 13,400 tickets in previews, in Denmark, thereby achieving the biggest opening weekend for a Danish drama in seven years (Later broken by Riders of Justice (2020) with over 125,000) . Total admissions have since reached over 840,000.
- According to Mads Mikkelsen, there was not any alcohol involved on shooting days. Yet off set, there was some experimentation on what specifically would happen at 0.05%, 0.08%... There was even a "little boot camp" to monitor how speech and movements changed. But for the "next crazy Charlie Chaplin level" the team watched a lot of YouTube videos.
- Thomas Vinterberg and the four main actors often meet up and bond over drinks after filming scenes.
- The film's original title, Druk, means "drinking" or "boozing" in Danish.
- The number of admissions for the film in Denmark was over half a million (in a country of 5.8 million people) in its first month.
- According to Thomas Vinterberg, the film is "a survey and exploration not only of alcohol usage but of the uncontrollable."
- Official submission of Denmark for the Best International Feature Film category of the 93rd Academy Awards in 2021.
- Official selection of the 2020 Cannes Film Festival, postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
- The third film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director, without being nominated for Best Picture, since the Academy increased the number of Best Picture nominees to more than five in 2009. The first two were Foxcatcher (2014) and Cold War (2018).
- The white ship with a yellow chimney in the last scene is named Dannebrog and belongs to the royal Danish family.