Did you know that Norway conducts an annual cross-country ski marathon? Well, I didn’t either until I watched The Wrong Track. The new Netflix original tells the story of Emilie, a young mother whose life feels like it’s stuck at the bottom of her overflowing toilet. Emilie’s challenged by her older brother, who has basically parented her, to do the Birken after she goes to live with him because of said overflowing toilet. Emilie’s life is a mess, and she’s never once tried to get things together. She has a daughter, but she can’t look after her. She doesn’t have a job to pay the bills and she’s basically got no skills either, so all she does is get piss drunk and live off the people who care for her. Emilie’s life is turned around when she decides to actually take up her brother’s challenge and complete the Birken against all odds. Will Emilie make it, or will she give up mid-way? This is the basic premise of The Wrong Track.
The 90-minute film has a few stories that lay out a mosaic at their intersection. One’s that of Emilie, but then there’s her brother and his wife who are struggling to have a baby. I suppose you could categorize this as a sports movie, but it’s more a family drama and, of course, a story of hope with a message to never give up because life will find its way to get you back on your feet, even when you’re in skis. This isn’t a survival movie like 127 Hours, though with the title it occasionally feels like something is going to go massively wrong. The Wrong Track is the one she was on in the past, the present one is the right one for Emilie. The story is simple yet layered thanks to the little side family drama with Gjermund and Silje.
The film is subtly comedic as intended in a very Norwegian way, so I guess in a way it’s actually a comedy (or if you consider the traditional meaning of the term). I want to emphasize that Gjermund is as unlikeable as Emilie is likeable. There’s a great contrast between the two siblings and their parallel stories run almost in reverse, but don’t worry, Gjermund gets his happy ending too. Emilie is a bit of a dunce, we know that she was raised by an absent mother and had a kid really early in life, she’s almost an alcoholic and yet when she takes on this challenge, you think to yourself, “She can do this…she has to do this.” I don’t know if it’s Ada Eide, who plays her, that makes her such a lovable character, or if it’s just the way she’s written. Maybe it’s a combination of both of those things.
If you’re feeling even remotely uninspired, I think The Wrong Track will immediately push you to get up off your bum. The film is pleasant to watch and feels raw, specifically because of the final half-hour, which focuses on the race itself. Of course, there’s also the little montage about working towards your goal that’ll make you scream at your screen “It’s not that easy.” But hey, I think it’s quite effective. There’s nothing extraordinary about this film, but it is, in a very Scandinavian way, minimalistic, subtle, yet impressively effective. There’s some profanity, nudity, and sex, so unfortunately, it’s not a family watch. In fact, I’d say the themes are very relevant to adults, specifically between their 30s and mid-life, I’d like to say. Though this doesn’t mean it’s uninteresting to other people, it just feels more obviously targeted.
Ada Eide is fantastic as Emilie and it seems like I’ve already raved about her, but I’ve got to say Trond Fausa is delightfully stoic as her elder brother Gjermund. They’re quite the fun duo, and even when you don’t know they’re siblings, you just know they’re siblings. Christian Rubek as the ex and baby-daddy is annoying, an almos-t antagonist who eventually learns his lesson, and Marie Blokhus is great as Silje, Gjermund’s wife. The rest of the cast is great too, with minor roles. Lilie is also adorable.
You can’t go without mentioning the Norwegian landscape while speaking about a film that is set around the Birken. The Norwegian mountains are stunning, and though we get limited access, it’s still enough to make you want to pack your bags and head up there onto the snow-clad trail without knowing a thing about skiing. At the end of the day, this is a feel-good movie and I think it does a dandy job of it. The Wrong Track is also a very culturally relevant movie, and there are many Norwegian-isms (if I can call them that) about it, which I absolutely love. As an outsider, it definitely feels like a real piece of Norway, which is exactly what we love to see in global cinema.
The film can occasionally come across as superficial, but I think the characters are actually quite deep, and we get to see them truly as the story progresses. It’s not that this is a nuanced story or you’re getting to see anything new, except for the Birken of course (if you didn’t know about it already), but it still feels really fresh, maybe because we barely see any Norwegian movies. While the movie is mostly unserious, there are a lot of serious topics dealt with here. If you’re not keen on reliving reality then I’d say tread with caution, but, this is not to say that the movie isn’t entertaining, it just might hit home in unexpected ways. I’d give The Wrong Track 3.5 out of 5 stars. It’ll definitely get you motivated, especially in the last few moments when you feel like you’re being celebrated with Emilie.
