Skip to main content

Sex

Panorama

This event has passed

Canadian Premiere

Two chimney sweeps, both happily partnered in heterosexual marriages, find their views on sexuality and gender challenged by a series of unexpected events. The company supervisor (Thorbjorn Harr) has a recurring dream where he’s seen as a woman. His employee (Jan Gunnar Roise), meanwhile, has a sexual encounter with a male client who casually propositions him after a job. Both events exert pressure on the men’s personal lives, but neither results in any sort of gay panic or masculine bravado—just a reflective, searching interest in heretofore unexplored aspects of their identity.

The first in a projected trilogy by Norwegian writer-director Dag Johan Haugerud, Sex—the other two films are to be titled Dreams and Love—is a frank exploration of normative social expectations in contemporary Oslo. Playfully structured as a series of sharply scripted two-hander conversations, the film is at once dryly humorous and unexpectedly poignant: a testament to the regions of experience that would open up, if only we would talk about them.

 

Ecumenical Jury Award, Berlin 2024

Director

Dag Johan Haugerud

Cast

Jan Gunnar Røise, Thorbjørn Harr, Siri Forberg, Birgitte Larsen

Credits
Country of Origin

Norway

Year

2024

Language

In Norwegian with English subtitles

Film Contact
Links
18+
125 min
Award Winners Comedy Drama Family Relations LGBTQIA2S+
Motlys

Book Tickets

This event has passed.

Credits

Producer

Yngve Sæther, Hege Hauff Hvattum

Screenwriter

Dag Johan Haugerud

Cinematography

Cecilie Semec

Editor

Jens Christian Fodstad

Production Design

Tuva Hølmebakk

Original Music

Peder Capjon Kjellsby

Dag Johan Haugerud headshot; Sex director

Dag Johan Haugerud

Dag Johan Haugerud (born 1964) is a screenwriter and director, known for his critically acclaimed novels, feature films, and short films. His feature film I Belong (2012) won the Amanda Award and the Canon Awards for Best Film, Director, Screenplay, and Supporting Actress (Laila Goody). He had a sweeping success with Beware of Children (2019) receiving the Dragon Award for Best Nordic Film and Actor (Henriette Steenstrup) at the Gothenburg Film Festival. Dag Johan Haugerud has also written several novels published by the Oktober publishing house and has created several critically acclaimed short films. Sex is the first film in the trilogy Sex Dreams Love to have its premiere.

Filmography: Thomas Hylland Eriksen og historien om origamijenta (2005); I Belong (2012); I’m the One You Want (2014); Barn (2019); The Light From the Chocolate Factory (2020)

Photo by Fin Serck Hansen

Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre

Heart of Gold
Heart of Gold film image; woman crouching by a burning miniature house

Heart of Gold

Dir. Patricia Gruben
80 min

Writer-director Patricia Gruben explores the history of an American deserter in 1969 who escapes to BC and finds shelter with a Russian dissident community.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Resident Orca

Dir. Sarah Sharkey Pearce & Simon Schneider
97 min

Captured in Puget Sound in 1970, killer whale Lolita spent the next half century in a cramped tank in Seaquarium, Miami. The film follows a coalition of Lummi elders, animal lovers and philanthropists on a rescue mission to return her to the ocean.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

No Other Land

Dir. Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham & Rachel Szor
96 min

Deemed by many critics one of the essential films of 2024, a multiple festival award winner and Academy Award winner for Best Documentary, No Other Land is a reminder that mass expulsion is by no means a new reality for Palestinians.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

Misericordia

Dir. Alain Guiraudie
103 min

Edgy, eccentric, and unapologetically queer, this film goes from drama to comedy without putting a foot wrong. Sex and murder are the subjects, and writer-director Alain Guiraudie (Stranger by the Lake) mines them for suspense and outrageous laughs.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre

There's Still Tomorrow

Dir. Paola Cortellesi
118 min

A critical and box office sensation in Italy, Paola Cortellesi's triumphant directorial debut is the tale of a Roman housewife in 1946, who stands up against the routine sexist abuse she suffers. Funny, heartbreaking and inspiring.

VIFF Centre - VIFF Cinema

The Way, My Way

Dir. Bill Bennett
93 min

All manner of pilgrims flock to France and Spain to walk the 800 km Camino de Santiago. One such is Bill, a stroppy sexagenarian Australian filmmaker who's determined to do the Camino with minimal prep, a dickey leg, and no firm idea why.

VIFF Centre - Lochmaddy Studio Theatre