Lukas Moodysson is an eccentric. He is an actor, a writer, a director, a costume designer, a casting director and any number of other titles that go along with his short but successful career in the movie business. He published a book at age 17 of poems that he always thought more people should have taken notice of. But the lack of public notoriety for his poems did not stop Lukas Moodysson from expressing himself in any public medium ho chose. He was born on January 17, 1969 in Malmo, Sweden. Today he still lives with his wife and children in Sweden and has begun to develop an impressive catalog of films to his credit. He prefers to write and direct and he is so successful in his native Sweden that he has won the Guldbaggar, the Swedish Oscar, 4 times in his career with his first win coming in 1999 at the ago of 30. Recognition from the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has yet to appear for Lukas but in the meantime he remains a very successful European director and writer with what seems to be an endless appeal to a large throng of fans.

In 2000 Lukas Moodysson let the world watch Together which was the English translation of his movie Tillsammans. When you watch Together you get a feel for the interaction between very diverse groups of people and how people that are traditionally known for not getting along can get along together and live in the same community. The story is about a woman named Elisabeth who is married to an abusive husband named Rolf. Rolf is a drinker who can get out of control when he is under the influence of alcohol. After another episode with her abusive husband Elisabeth decides to take herself and her two kids and leave Rolf. They wind up living in a commune with Elisabeth’s brother Goran and the collection of characters at this commune is very unique. You need to really pay attention to find out which characters are gay or straight, which ones think they are gay but are not, which ones want to be gay but cannot be, and the ones that do not know what they are and decide they will live as both. It can get to be very confusing but within the context of this community comes this family of three and even though Goran’s girlfriend does not like the idea of the family living with them, the commune reaches out and accepts the family as their new members and starts to get them mixed up in the lives of the people in the commune. After a while Rolf realizes that he has made a mistake and wants his family back. He sobers up and then sets out to convince Elisabeth to come back home. The story from there takes many unusual twists and turns.

When you watch Together you are looking into the complex mind of Moodysson and his eccentric ideas on life. If you watch Together closely you will begin to understand Moodysson’s opinions on human relationships and how the different aspects of human behavior can cause relationships to be difficult to maintain. The acting is superb and the movie not only won Moodysson and the actors in it many film awards but it also enjoyed limited success with a run in the United States who went to watch Together and may have opened up a new audience to Lukas Moodysson.