Popular reviews

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  Review by Karst ★★★★★

  feels like i just got hit by a bus

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  Review by Lise ★★★★ 19

  This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

  If someone wants to destroy himself, society should allow him to do so

  Oslo, August 31 is the very sad story of a self-reflective young man who cannot escape what he sees as the meaninglessness of his life. Anders has been trying to find happiness or if not that then something, anything, on which to hang hope, to no avail. He turned to drugs. The weight of his existential views combined with the destruction he caused through drug use is almost unbearable. Now almost done with rehab, it should be a time for new beginnings. A little bit of hope should spring forth. And it does one evening when he meets with Malin, an old friend. But looking at her…

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  Review by Lucy ★★★½ 1

  most of the movie actually took place on august 30th. i feel so betrayed

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  Review by DirkH ★★★★★ 19

  Film #10 of Make me watch your favourite.
  Recommended by Steve.

  Films this honest and sincere deserve nothing other than 5 stars.

  We get one day. One day to explore the life of one man. And while we are experiencing that day, dissecting his character, seeing the world through his eyes, we learn a little bit about ourselves. About how fallible we are, how narrow minded we can be and that, in the end no matter how often we reach out, we are here to fight our own battles. Battles which are sometimes impossible to win.

  Following a day in the life of a recovering drug addict who is out of rehab for one day to go to a job…

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  Review by Melisa ★★★★★ 2

  this movie cured my happiness

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  Review by Eli Hayes ★★★★½ 3

  The world does away with the depressed. The depressive individual is met with a superficial environment in which mental health is not only heavily stigmatized, but the depressed person is seen as a burden & a bummer. The absence of a smile across one's face is inappropriately treated as a load which the "happy," or the blissfully ignorant, wrongly see themselves as having to carry. So the "happy" slowly distance themselves from the "sad." No room for individuals who are considered downers in a world fueled by shallow serotonin shifts, inauthentic beauty, and the faux contentment of monetary obsession.

  Genuine smiles -- and genuine happiness -- aside, sorry for not being able to put on a fabricated one. Apologies, that you…

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  Review by Edgar Cochran ✝️ ★★★★★ 15

  "If someone wants to destroy himself, society should allow him to do so."

  Opening with a Resnais perspective about the entrails of a city and its inhabitants, developing the story with a Moodysson-like minimalist and introspective style, and concluding with an Antonioni fashion, Oslo, 31. august is a depressing character study of a man's weaknesses and his incapability to cope with a society that has condemned him so much for reasons that we are never mentioned so that we do not have any moral or judgmental bias beforehand.

  Human hipocrisy is endless. Man thinks he is the perfect juror of the world, even assigning degrees of seriousness to immoral acts, but forgets about his own faults, like if one particular…

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  Review by Jonathan White ★★★★ 16

  It’s hard to say I ‘like’ Oslo, August 31st as it’s just so damn sad. Sad in a completely uncontrived, realistic way. It’s the type of sad that gets under your skin and chills your soul.

  I knew right from the beginning that Anders end was fait accompli. What affected me most were Andres’s reflexive spasms in the form of small cries for help. Even if answered, I know the help would not have been accepted. As the day progresses, even these basic instincts of self preservation dwindle.

  Just after I finished watching, I wished that the second half of the film was more like the first. While the first half was unique and soul wrenching, I thought that the…

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  Review by Roberto_ ★★★★ 4

  yes i actually watched oslo, august 31st on the 31st of august⠀ 
       (\____/)
       (•(ㅅ)•)
     ＿ノ ヽ ノ＼＿
  `/   `/ ⌒Ｙ⌒ Ｙ  ヽ
  (    (三ヽ人　 /      |
  |   ﾉ⌒＼ ￣￣ヽ   ノ
  ヽ ＿＿＿＞､＿＿_／
       ｜( 王 ﾉ〈
       /ﾐ`ー―彡\
      /   ╰ ╯    \ how could you tell?

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  Review by Jack ★★★★★ 3

  “Look at my life. I'm 34 years old. I've got nothing. I don't want to start from scratch.”
  
  Oslo, August 31st explores the mundanity of our lives through the eyes of Anders: a drug addict giving up on life. Throughout the course of the film, Anders sees the many people he knows and loves move on to start families and do something important with their lives, while he’s stuck in a perpetual cycle of addiction desperately trying to rid himself of those demons. He wanders the city of Oslo searching for meaning in this somewhat purposeless life of his. As he finds himself stuck, stuck in a spot in which recovery or tragedy could occur at any moment. And no one or…

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  Review by mathew ★★★★½ 1

  this vogue's '24 hours with' episode was very melancholic

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  Review by KYK ★★★★

  so vulnerable to familiar trappings of a drug-addict-in-recovery story, and yet...my heart is especially sore and tender for this one. maybe because anders is strangely endearing in his coldness. he navigates with a kind of numbness that makes him hard to read, but you still feel his embarrassment, despair, and skepticism. the job interview scene shows how charismatic and brilliant he can be, a realization that makes his gap years even more unbearable and heartbreaking. anders, of course, leaves in a huff when further questioned.

  joachim trier follows anders with complete empathy. as viewers, who have only known anders for the unfolding day, we exist somewhere between the old friends he visits throughout the day (some of whom react like…