Pelle the Conqueror

REVIEW
Winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Picture, this epic drama about human resilience stars the hypnotic von Sydow as a poor, but never downtrodden widower who emigrates with his young son from the economically depressed Sweden to Denmark at the turn of the century. His illusory quest for the good life leads only to a straw bed in the cold barn of a brutally insensitive farmer. The story centers around the close relationship between the father and son as they attempt to eke out a happy life amid crushing oppression.