But it’s not until he takes a job as a photographer’s assistant and goes to Somalia on assignment that he starts to find direction. In elegant, clipped scenes of domestic life in small-town Denmark, the film shows him quietly indulged by his parents (Jens Jørn Spottag and Christiane Gjellerup Koch), snarked at by his brusque elder sister Anita (Sofie Torp) and supported by his steadfast girlfriend Signe (Sara Hjort Ditlevsen). Partly, the balance between gritty, true-life fidelity and pacy, exciting storytelling is achieved because in Rye, to whom Eric Kress’ warm, compassionate camera clings so doggedly, we have such a sympathetic, human protagonist.Ī promising gymnast whose hazy future plans are dashed by a career-ending injury, Daniel (Smed) is introduced drifting in that relatably twentysomething way. Berthelsen, as well as a superb, exceptionally physical lead performance from Esben Smed, to adapt it into “Daniel,” a polished, moving, muscular thriller that never exploits or simplistically reduces its real-life horrors for entertainment value. This is the inherently dramatic true story told in Puk Damsgaard Andersen’s book “The ISIS Hostage,” but it takes intelligence and paradoxical restraint from directors Niels Arden Oplev (Sweden’s “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”) and Anders W. Ransomed and held captive for 13 months, Rye was psychologically and physically tortured, starved and beaten by his captors, first on his own and then alongside several other international hostages, among them U.S. In 2013, Daniel Rye, a Danish photographer in his mid-twenties, went to Syria to document the plight of civilian refugees and was kidnapped by ISIS.

The book of daniel movie review