Kitchen Stories (Salmer fra Kjøkkenet)
Bent Hamer

Nathalie Rothschild

This Norwegian/Swedish tale is about observational studies carried out by the Swedish Home Research Institute (HRI) in the 1950s. Eighteen observers set out to study kitchen routines of bachelors in the Norwegian town Landstad.

The study was based on the format of a previous one in which the voluntary subjects were Swedish housewives whose kitchen habits were closely monitored over a set period of time. The purpose of this blue-print model of 'positivist research' was to develop more efficient and convenient kitchen layouts and minimise the users' efforts so as to relieve her or him of unnecessary work burdens.

This rather dry and clinical subject-matter is turned into a heartwarming story of the forbidden relationship that develops between the observer and the observed, or Folke and Isak. With clear instructions not to, under any circumstances, interact with the subject of study, the researcher is put in a position which not only limits possibilities of understanding the 'target population', but also sustains the unequal relationship between the two (not least by the fact that the researcher sits in a chair which resembles the ones used by judges of tennis matches) and turns the volunteer's kitchen into a laboratory.

In other words, the research project makes all the mistakes 'in the field' that anthropologists and other social researchers are still warned about, including the danger of offering gifts to one's hosts. This can cause tension in the host community by not rewarding everyone equally. It may also invoke false hopes for further payments and cause the participant to volunteer for the wrong reasons. Isak's horse is dying and he volunteered with the HRI because he was promised a Dala horse. Little did he know that a Dala horse is a painted wooden figurine and a common Swedish souvenir and national symbol.

Another issue that the contemporary social researcher must be wary of is the claim to objectivity. She or he must instead acknowledge the influence of the observer on the observed and on the outcomes of the study. In defiantly changing all his regular routines, which Folke is there to observe, Isak risks making HRI construct kitchens where bachelors do not cook and eat, but hang laundry and give their friends hair cuts. When he is scrutinised by a researcher, Isak prefers to cook in his bedroom. He also torments Folke by leaving him alone in his chair with nothing to observe but the darkness after Isak has switched the lights off, and nothing to listen in on except the annoying dripping of the tap that Isak leaves open on purpose.

Isak's and Folke's relationship gradually changes from one of hostility and lack of understanding to one of mutual respect and friendship. The importance of getting to know the other in order to more fully understand his routines and needs dawns upon Folke's colleague, who starts drinking with his volunteer. 'How can we understand them if we don't talk to them?' he asks Folke, who admits 'I have spoken to mine too!'.

There is another aspect of the hierarchical relationship which positions Folke and Isak as the observer and observed, analyst and analysed etc. This aspect is the relation between Sweden and Norway and tensions between the two countries in post-war times. It is best expressed in Isak's remarks on the HRI's fake or pretentious claims to objectivity and the parallel he draws to Sweden's 'neutrality' during the war.

In short, this no-frills, dry-humoured film turns out to be a complex story about scientific research, friendship and understanding (or the lack of it) and about Norwegian-Swedish relations. The efficient kitchen also reflects the efficient society, as visualised by the HRI. But in whose interest is it to create this kitchen (and society)?

Patrick Hayes

Writer-director Bent Hamer's Kitchen Stories is a multi-faceted film. It is an examination of social attitudes held between two neighbouring countries in post-war Scandinavia. It is also a deeply humorous tale of the unique interaction between some fascinating characters. It is even an effective critique of behavioral 'positivist' psychology. The film's leading strength, however, is its warm account of two individuals rebelling against the formal constraints that stop them from interacting and gradually forging a deep friendship.

The film's anti-hero, the Swedish psychologist Folke (Thomas Norstrom), is introduced to us as part of a convoy of cars towing surreal green oval caravans driving across the bleak winter landscape. In an early attempt at consumer analysis, Folke and fellow psychologists are assigned the project of spending the winter days observing the movements of single male volunteers around their kitchens around a remote Norwegian town. Instructed by the officious Malmberg (Reine Brynoffsson) to obtain an 'objective' analysis of their movements, it is a cardinal sin for the psychologists to interact with their subjects.

What is not anticipated, and what the film brings out beautifully, is the fact that this cold, objective approach has a deep effect upon those being observed. Nowhere is this more the case than in the situation between Folke and his reluctant volunteer, the grizzly, aging Isak (Joachim Calmeyer). Folke sits day after day suspended in the corner of the kitchen on a giant highchair. Every time Isak makes a movement, he records them coolly and noisily in his pad with a pencil. Folke's cold objectification of Isak generates self-consciousness and paranoia. He responds bitterly, switching off lights and leaving Folke to sit in the dark and intentionally obscuring the meanings behind his actions causing Folke to become confused and to endlessly rub out his recordings.

Far from providing Folke with an understanding of Isak, the strict rule preventing the two men from having an exchange serves solely to evoke a deep curiosity in both of them about each other: Isak drills a hole in the ceiling and begins to observe Folke at work and Folke begins to burst with questions about Isak's confusing behaviour. The aim of the psychological study is continually made to appear more and more ridiculous and it becomes obvious that without interaction there can be little understanding of the subject's movements around the kitchen.

Part of Hamer's genius is that there is not one pivotal instance leading to the kindling of their friendship, rather a series of small exchanges that gradually blossom into a friendship. Although it is genuine compassion that sparks their first exchanges, the remarkable thing about this film is that it is their initial cold, objectifying behaviour towards each other that leads them to gradually build up an intimate friendship. The only reference to Sweden's passivity during the war comes during a conversation between the two early on. Folke agrees wholeheartedly with Isak's condemnation of Swedish policy and the issue is dissolved, not necessary to be raised again.

Despite the remote, perhaps unlikely, surroundings, Hamer gives a strong, realistic portrait of the characters and how they begin to value their friendship above all else. Their situation as two isolated, private individuals in an isolated farm allows the formation of a friendship to be presented in a remarkably pure form. This is shown with minimal sentiment, especially as the generation of the new friendship leads to the sidelining of Isak's existing friend Grant, whose frustration and loneliness leads him to attempt murder. Notably absent from the film are any female characters whatsoever so, unlike in Peter Weir's Master and Commander, there is no need to deal with sexuality. To claim the film offers descriptions of latent homosexuality would be to say far more about the claimant than any actual content existing in the film itself.

The picture painted here is hardly optimistic. At the end of the film all the characters can hope for is to provide solace and company for each other and for once enjoy a Christmas with friends. Folke's career has ended, Isak's horse is dead and Grant's mental stability must still be dubious. Hamer's examination of the nature of friendship offers a classic account of how imposed formal relations between people can evoke strong human responses, leading to an awareness that reciprocal understanding is of paramount importance. Similar to Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation, what Hamer cannot show, however, is what to do with the informal friendships when they have developed. This means that although there are some consoling instances of human warmth, the vision of the future remains bleak.