Ruben Östlund was the director who made Force Majeure, a film that both of us liked and has remained fresh in our minds. The Square is the first film that he has made since then, suggesting that he takes his time with his projects and it won plenty of accolades and awards. Though this is a Swedish film, it features two recognizable Anglo-Saxon stars, Elizabeth Moss and Dominic West who speak only English in their performances here.

Christian is the curator for a contemporary art museum in Stockholm where they are promoting a new exhibit called ‘The Square’. It consists of simply a square line on the floor and comes with the artist’s manifesto that all are equal inside it. However he is distracted by being the victim of a confidence scam and having his wallet and phone pickpocketed. Having tracked his phone’s location, one of his museum staff members suggests going to the building in question and putting flyers in every apartment to demand the return of the items. Surprisingly it works and the items are returned anonymously to a convenient 7-11 branch but a small boy is upset about being wrongly accused of being a thief. Meanwhile the marketing team makes a controversial video to promote The Square without his input and in between all this he also has a brief fling with an American journalist.

The brief summary above however comes nowhere close to doing justice to the rich diversity of events and situations depicted in this film. In addition to The Square itself, there are numerous other exhibits such as the piles of gravel on the floor. The most striking scene is a performance artist acting as if he were a gorilla amidst the tuxedo and evening gown wearing VIP guests of the museum. Another is when Christian spends the night in the home of the American journalist Anne played by Moss and is shocked to see a chimpanzee there. Then they proceed to have sex and no one talks about the chimpanzee. You might not always understand the point of every scene but the impact that they have on the audience is undeniable. It is easy to see that this is a complex, multi-layered film that demands a close reading yet at the same is immediately appealing to the senses.

As my wife noted, one way of reading it is noticing how it delights in presenting contrasts and contradictions. An easy example is the placid docility of Anne’s chimpanzee compared to the bullying hostility of the human gorilla. Another is how the theme of the new exhibit is all about equality and inclusiveness while most people outside the museum itself, including Christian himself most of the time, barely acknowledge the many beggars hanging around. Most fascinating is how this extends to the treatment of contemporary art. Part of the film plays up the inaccessibility, pomposity and general suspicion that it’s all a sort of the emperor has no clothes scam. One scene has an artists played by West trying to give a talk explaining his work that is filled with the usual avant-garde and nigh incomprehensible buzzwords while a member of the audience, supposedly afflicted with Tourette syndrome shouts expletives at him. On the other hand, the performance of the human gorilla, as disturbing as it is, is genuinely powerful and affecting. Given the career of Östlund  and the other people involved in this film, it’s hard to believe that they are seriously attacking abstract contemporary art in general, merely that they are more than willing to mock its worst aspects, which makes this pretty cool film in my book.

The film covers many more topics, including what feels like making fun of Sweden’s deeply ingrained sense of political correctness while also celebrating the diversity and moderation it encourages. I also suspect that not being a Swedish speaker, some parts of the film are lost in translation as the Swedish accent or lack thereof of some characters seems to matter. The lack of certainty about some aspects of the director’s intent causes me reserve my judgment somewhat but on the whole I found this to be a very impressive film that offers an intelligent treatment of complex issues while being highly entertaining to watch.