The Worst Person In The World is a Norwegian film from writer-director Joachim Trier which was nominated for two categories (Best Original Screenplay and Best International Feature Film) at the 94th Academy Awards and made a big splash. For her outstanding performance Renate Reinsve won the Best Actress award at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival where the film premiered.
The film is structured with twelve chapters along with a prologue and epilogue and it plays in a liner way. While wondering about her career Julie wonders about her relationships too. She is not sure about what she wants to do with her life. Actually, she is not sure about anything. She is at her late 20s and trying to figure things out. She changes her mind every now and then. While studying as a medical student she changes her course to psychology finding the mind more interesting than the body. She breaks up with her boyfriend too. Soon after she gets involved with her professor. Then again while scrolling her phone's photo gallery she decides to become a photographer and finds a new boyfriend. As soon as she meets Aksel, a renowned comic artist, she falls for him and the two starts a new relationship though Aksel is fifteen years older than Julie!
Aksel wants to have kids while Julie doesn't. Despite having their differences, they seem a really happy couple trying to stick to each other. Julie now works at a book store while Aksel is becoming more popular through his works. Crashing a party Julie meets Eivind but the two decide not cheat their partner, they don't even exchange their number or full name so that they can't find each other if they want to. But when Julie meets Eivind for the second time by chance, she seems hectic. God! she wants to be with him very much. What will she do now? How is she gonna leave Aksel as she loves him very much too? How is she gonna say that to him? This time it's difficult but she finally does leave Aksel tearfully.
Eivind is fun and they are so happy together until Julie accidently gets pregnant. In the meantime, she meets one of Aksel's friend who informs that Aksel got cancer and he doesn't have much time as his condition is worsening. Julie decides to go see him and Aksel becomes nostalgic seeing her and starts talking too much as he fears death. Finally, the message comes that Aksel will likely not make it through the night. The following morning Julies sadly walks through the streets and watches the sunrise. Later in her shower Julie miscarriages. And in the epilogue, we see Julie, working as an on-set photographer, notices Eivind comes to receive his wife/partner (the girl Julie was photographing earlier) with a baby with him.
Though Julie keeps making mistakes throughout the film, it seems so easy to relate to her and to understand why she does what she does, to feel the way she feels while we don't know much about her past life which remained a mystery as the director didn't reveal much about her, except the fact that she doesn't have a good relationship with her father who is kinda creepy. There is disappointment, frustration, regret and pain in Julie’s life but there is freedom!
Renate Reinsve did a wonderful job. Her eyes, her smiles, her expressions, her beauty… everything is mind-blowing, even when she cries walking through the streets alone, she sparks. There is a sequence in the film where everything pause as Julie (Renate Reinsve) starts running from one lover to another through the streets of beautiful Oslo, is breathtaking! And Joachim Trier brilliantly did the job in propounding the character study of a woman entering her 30s. And the cinematography is extraordinarily beautiful. Treat to eyes!
Film Rating: 4/5