Cast

Anne Marie Ottersen, Frøydis Armand, Katja Medbøe

awards

Amanda Awards, Norway 1986 – Best Film, Best Actress

Film description

In Wives – the first part of Anja Breien’s ‘female trilogy’ – the three central characters realised that they had to make difficult choices after being stirred from the lethargy of marriage and motherhood, which Breien presented as burdens and emotional blackmail. In this sequel, the director shows how the three protagonists – Mie, Kaja and Heidrun – have evolved since seizing on opportunities at self-realization.

The attractive women, now in their forties – at their prime, as Kaja insists – still fall into traps, however. The divorced Mie can’t decide which of two men to choose and dreams of marrying them both. Kaja runs a gift shop and manipulates her bourgeois husband; she has amassed considerable personal wealth, but her insatiable desire for sex leads into eccentric dalliances. The most independent of the three friends, Heidrun, has unhappily fallen in love with a married man; she only yearns for some slight gesture from her beloved to give here hope for the future.

The characters, places and situations we first met in Wives reappear in Breien’s sequel. The director attempts to capture the passage of time, bringing changes, which never seem quite fulfilled.