Program Note
University freshman Thelma’s life on campus is a series of routines. Maybe it’s her strict Christian upbringing, but she seems more hung up on calling her parent everyday to report her whereabouts than enjoying her independence and newfound freedom, that is until she meets another student, Anja. Small transgressions slowly create fissures in Thelma’s daily rituals as well as confusion to eventually disclose the unusual power and a dark secret she has held inside. The issues that Thelma raises such as supernatural and psychic powers, oppression and the will for freedom, realization of sexuality and sexual identity cannot be defined in a clear cut way, nor does the film attempt to give us a definite resolution. The premise of human control vs. transgression and guilt that stems from this clash may set up Thelma as a ‘coming-of-age’ story, but the various layers piled onto this simple narrative structure actually inspires a more rich list of discourses. The contrast of the vast Norwegian nature and the bleak images of campus life suggests that what is happening to Thelma is “much greater than us”, but it also seems to be telling us that perhaps ‘it is something to be accepted and not be controlled by human force’. (Hanna LEE)