Movies about World War II are typically about big, sweeping things. Battles. Horror. The Holocaust. And in many ways, that’s understandable. Those parts of the story need to be told, sometimes over and over again, lest we forget. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t truth and sometimes power in other, quieter parts of the story. Elsa is Rebecca King’s attempt at telling one of those other stories, and it’s a sweeping success, thanks to a superb script by Lizzie Nunnery and a brilliant performance by Nina Yndis.
The short, just by the constraints of the genre, has to get to the action quickly. But as much as Elsa doesn’t suffer from the lack of setup a longer movie would inevitably give us, there is indeed a feeling that Elsa would also work as a longer film. That feels like an unconventional win on the part of both Lizzie Nunnery and Rebecca King. As a self-contained story, Elsa works to give you a clear glimpse at what it was like to be a woman during a specific time. It also attempts to frame that in the context of what it is to be a woman …well, always.
But Elsa doesn’t have time to sit with that, it has to leave you to think about it. If it manages to do so, it’s because Nina Yndis can portray every moment of the journey, the confusion, the moment when things change for her, and then they don’t, because even if they do, the world hasn’t actually changed. But most importantly Yndis has that haunting final scene with Jonas Strand Gravli, the guy you want to root for at the beginning of the short, turned into the definition of toxic masculinity.
There’s a lot to unpack in their last interaction. The short is about womanhood, yes, and about the roles women play both in war and in peace, and what their bodies and their suffering represent. But those things are intrinsically tied to the role toxic masculinity plays in our society. If men didn’t feel entitled to dictate how women behave, then would women have to fear what they do or how they do it?
And that goes not just for who Elsa chooses to sleep with, but goes deeper, into the dynamics of power of her relationship with a German officer in a time of war. Did someone consider this as they hauled women into the street to be shamed and persecuted for a decision they made during a terrible time, a decision that might have saved their lives and secured their families? Most likely not. Nuance is often lost in war, and it is almost always lost in discussions surrounding women.
The rest we know. There’s no forgiveness for Nazis or those who helped them, and the short does exist within a sense of comfort because Elsa isn’t in real danger, not even at the end. The danger of shame and humiliation isn’t the danger so many people faced during WWII. But that part, like a lot in Elsa, is left unsaid. If you are watching the short with historical knowledge, you understand. This is a story told from the side of privilege. It’s still a story worth telling, but it is important to note that.
In the end, Yndis’ Elsa can do nothing more than look forward and accept her fate. That, in so many ways, is the story of women. And Elsa is, about that, women. The context is, of course, historical. This really happened in Norway after WWII ended. But the truth is, it didn’t just happen in Norway. It famously happened in France as well as in Serbia. Norway is, however, the only of those three countries that has apologized. The only one that has tried to reckon with the nuances of the moment.
Entertainment can sometimes change minds, but at the very least, it can educate us. Elsa does both and pulls us into a story about womanhood, one that sadly, still feels relevant to this day.
Elsa will premiere at the 2024 Flickers’ Rhode Island International Film Festival in August.
