Chinaman

Keld is a plumber and his wife of twenty-five years has left him. Since he cannot cook, he takes food every evening from the Chinese restaurant in the neighbourhood and starts eating his way through the menu in order. One day the owner asks him for a favour: to marry his sister from China on paper so she can come to Denmark. Keld agrees. Henrik Ruben Genz's film is about a marriage on paper turning into a real thing, but it does this very slowly rather than at the speed of a romantic comedy. Neither side talks much; Keld has no Chinese and she has no Danish. Bjarne Henriksen and Vivian Wu carry both parts through silence. The director Nicolas Winding Refn appears in a small role. The secret that surfaces in the middle of the film does not end the relationship; it only changes why it was formed.