HIGH AND DRY
The Good Traitor's lofty premise diminished by its textbook-like script
Back in 2008, Danish director
Ole Christian Madsen delivered to the screen Flammen & Citronen (Flame & Citron), starring Mads Mikkelsen (you know him) and Thure Lindhardt (you probably don't, but no matter) as a couple of Danish resistance fighters battling the Nazi occupation during the Second World War. It was a crackerjack film, full of daring deeds, hair-raising missions and moral ambiguity, with a little romance thrown into the mix.
The Good Traitor, directed by Christina Rosendahl, is no Flame & Citron. Dour and talky, it's all lemons and no fire.
The time period is the same.
It's 1939, and the Nazis are steamrollering their way across Europe. But rather than being set on the cobbled streets of Copenhagen, The Good Traitor takes place in the corridors of power in Washington, where Danish ambassador Henrik Kauffmann (Ulrich Thomsen) follows the news closely, between champagne-fuelled garden parties hosted by his vivacious American wife Charlotte (Denise Gough).
Thanks to Charlotte's high-society connections, Henrik has the ear of President Roosevelt (Henry Goodman), but he doesn't much like what the president is saying. Roosevelt, eager to avoid offending isolationists in the Senate, tells Henrik that the U.S. will object — vehemently! — if Denmark is attacked. Henrik would rather have fewer words and more action.
It all comes to a head when Germany does indeed invade Denmark, in April 1940. History records that the Danish government surrendered within two hours, with the government and king remaining nominally in power, and Denmark becoming a protectorate of Germany. Henrik, in a bold and potentially treasonous move, decides to declare himself and his staff independent of king and country, refusing to take any orders from a government that has no free will.
If all this sounds a little dry — well, it is. There's a good reason why The Good Traitor, released in Denmark as Vores mand i Amerika, or Our Man in America, was nominated for nine awards from the Danish Film Academy, but won only three, for its cinematography, costumes and production design. It's a lovely looking film with a script that reads like a textbook.
Here's Roosevelt, spelling out what Henrik is up to: “If
one didn't know any better, one might be inclined to think that you were trying to send the United States into war to protect your own unilateralism against the wishes of your government.” Spot on, Franklin!
Or take this bit of dialogue. Roosevelt to Henrik: “One thing I don't understand. Are you trying to save yourself or the whole world?” Henrik, striking a heroic pose: “What's the difference?”
Ah, but there is a difference, and it's one that The Good Traitor, despite that teasing English title, seems reluctant to explore. Was Henrik, a career diplomat who went on to great things at the United Nations in the postwar period, a patriot who feared for his country's future under Nazi rule? Or was he a Machiavellian, using the fog of war to anoint himself “King of Greenland,” as many called him after he chose to negotiate on behalf of the Danish territory?
It's possible he was a little of both — a bit of flammen, a bit of citronen, if you will — but director Rosendahl never leans in far enough to weigh in on the matter. Instead, we spend a lot of time on Henrik's infatuation with his wife's sister. At one point, Roosevelt listens sympathetically to Charlotte's concerns, which is rich when you recall that he had a longtime affair with his own wife's secretary, and may even then have been cavorting with Crown Princess Martha of Norway, who was a frequent guest at the White House at the time.
None of this is brought up in the film.
The Good Traitor seems on the verge of turning into a different movie entirely at one point, when the Danish government cuts off Henrik's line of credit, and he sets his sights on the nation's gold reserve, which has been moved to the U.S. Federal Reserve for safekeeping. I had hopes for a heist subplot — The Danish Job? — but had to settle for Henrik politicking his way into possession of the bullion, to the not-very-heisty tune of Yes Indeed, a swing hit from 1941. Another potential dramatic flame, snuffed.