Families Like Ours

Episode 1

Sig nærmer tiden

Tue, Jun 10, 202549 mins

'Families like ours' begins in the middle of the Danish summer, when life goes on as usual. But like lightning from a clear sky, everything is torn apart. The rising water level can no longer be ignored, and the government decides that all of Denmark must be evacuated. All property is at once worthless, and houses and institutions are left alone, while families, friends and lovers are forced in separate directions. Those who can afford it travel to wealthy countries, while the less well-off depend on the state-funded program and must move wherever there is space. Chaos, division and powerlessness knock on the Danes. But despite the farewell to the homeland, the world still turns. In many places, love also grows, people are reconciled, and the hope of being reunited lives on. 'Families like ours' is a magnificent and intimate family drama about parting with our country and everything we know, and about people's indomitable will to survive, hope and love. Thomas Vinterberg's first drama series had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on 31 August. On their way out of Denmark and down through Europe, we follow a large Danish family and their closest relatives. We meet the two young students Laura (Amaryllis August) and Elias (Albert Rudbeck Lindhardt), who fall in love with each other. We meet Laura's divorced parents: her father, the successful architect Jacob (Nikolaj Lie Kaas), and her mother, the stressed-out science journalist Fanny (Paprika Steen). We also meet Jacob's new wife Amalie (Helene Reingaard Neumann), Amalie's brother Nikolaj (Esben Smed) and his husband Henrik (Magnus Millang), Henrik's unruly brother Peter (David Dencik), Fanny's brother Holger (Thomas Bo Larsen) and the boy Lucas ( Max Kaysen Høyrup) and his mother Christel (Asta Kamma August), who cross paths with the family.