Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder
Trump Power
Release Date: 31 July
PG | 85 minutes Director: Arild Fröhlich Cast: Eilif Hellum Noraker, Emily Glaister, Kristoffer Joner, Atle Antonsen
Jo Nesbø’s bloody
oeuvre has brought Nordic noir to readers worldwide. Less known, outside Scandinavia at least, is his output as a children’s author, a sideline that should get more exposure with the release of this Roald Dahl- like fantasy.
Set in a picturesque hamlet, it tells of two children – sensible Lise and bequiffed urchin Nilly – and their friendship with Doctor Proctor, a reclusive eccentric whose latest invention makes whoever ingests it guff enough to send them airborne. To Lise and Nilly, this brightly- coloured powder is a delightful plaything they can flog to their schoolmates and use to wreak revenge on a pair of bullying twins. But to tycoon Herr Thrane, it’s a surefire goldmine he’ll stop at nothing to get.
This could never be accused of being sophisticated. Yet it remains a pleasantly breezy diversion, grotesque enough in places to recall Jean- Pierre Jeunet, with an artfully cluttered aesthetic redolent of Wes Anderson. A poignant flashback to Proctor’s lost Parisian love is amusingly staged as a silent film pastiche, and there’s a WTF interlude involving a CG serpent alerting kids to the dangers of flushing pets down the toilet.
“You may find what follows a little crude,” intones an unseen narrator at the beginning. “But we can’t help it if you’re a big prude!” You’d have to be a big one indeed to take offence at this affably knockabout yarn. Neil Smith