eyeintrees My goodness, this film is nothing short of superb. On many levels it addresses the most prevailing themes of humanity and yet it is entwined with the beauty and majesty of music.Superbly acted, cleverly crafted, something of a little masterpiece.Where fear prevails there is suspicion of even the most innocent circumstances and where repression of the most basic human needs take place there can only be mayhem.How love and the enduring commitment to feel joy wins the day and leads the viewer to a bittersweet conclusion.This is one to watch again and again and revel in each and every time.

omnigate Kay Pollak, the Director and one of the authors, is A Course In Miracles student and it shows in this movie at several key moments including messages about love, minds joining, union, miracles, Christ vision, judgment, humility, the illusion of fear, forgiveness and the Holy Instant. Anders Nyberg, one of the writes and also a Course student, was the model for the lead character in the movie, who is a choir conductor. Highly recommend for Course Students and any other spiritual seekers that like seeing love wide open with no earthly barriers containing it all. God does not forgive, because e has never condemned.

Laura Hein Kay Pollack's sometimes annoyingly uplifting moralistic film, "As It Is in Heaven", shows the story of a man returning to his hometown marked by his own sad memories of his childhood. Daniel Darius, played by Michael Nyqvist, is an extremely successful and gifted conductor, composer, and musician but is forced to question his career after a serious health scare. Daniel moves back to his hometown and is coerced into listening to a local choir, despite his protests. He eventually concedes to directing and teaching the choir once he discovers an interest in one of the choir members. The influence of religion is heavy and rather obvious in this film. The choir is a church choir that sings religious songs, both in Swedish and English. There are moralistic themes in the storyline such as: believing in oneself, finding ones voice, going on despite the odds, etc. The fact that the main character, Daniel Darius, is shown to have risen from oppression into excellence and to have overcome odds propels him to some sort of Christ figure. If Pollack had intended to make any subtle comparisons or similarities to religion, he failed miserably. In a bit of an interesting contrast, Pollack also highlights violence, specifically violence perpetuated by men who are supposed leaders of their church or family. Conny, played by Per Morberg, is Daniel's childhood bully who has stayed in their hometown and married a woman whom he controls in almost every aspect beats his wife and Daniel when he is displeased. Also, the pastor, Stig played by Niklas Falk, turns to violent actions against his wife Inger, played by Ingela Olsson when she displays questionable actions in his view. It is difficult to understand why Pollack included this violence alongside the more moralistic and holy religious themes especially given the fact that the pastor is involved in this violence. So it almost seems as if Pollack is supporting spirituality and religion but not the hierarchical nature and old rules of the church. Stemming from this strange side by side comparison of religion and violence, the idea of hypocrisy is shown through the entire film. Going back to Stig, the pastor, it is revealed to the viewer that he hides pornographic magazines in his house for his own sexual pleasure, and his wife knows of this but doesn't acknowledge it until a key point in their relationship. So while he claims to be this holy man, he is just as weak to sexual pleasures as any regular person, and instead of acknowledging this, he chooses to hide it and make himself a hypocrite. Towards the beginning of the film, it is shown how Daniel lives and breathes his music, which is the love of his life. Once he moves to his hometown, he initially refuses to help a choir who only wants to live and breathe their own music. It seems that Daniel understood what a hypocritical stance this was and decided to help the choir (it also helped that a beautiful woman was a member in the choir, but I'd rather give Daniel a bit more credit than that). Now as to why I am only giving this film a five out of ten. I do not enjoy films that hit a viewer over the head with the intended theme or moral of the story. This is purely personal preference when it comes down to it, but I'd rather have a very open film that has many interpretations than a very closed one with a very intended result. It may be more approachable to more viewers because of how easy the meaning of the story is to grasp, but I'd like to think that I am not a normal, ignorant film-goer. This just wasn't a sophisticated plot that made me think. Nonetheless, Michael Nyqvist did a wonderful acting as Daniel Darius and his wide range of emotions, but even a good actor cannot save a movie like this one. "As It Is in Heaven" most definitely had an agenda in its storyline, not that that is generally a bad thing, but how Pollack went about doing it made it too redundant for my taste. Although there were some interesting contrasts between religion, violence and hypocrisy, it did not feel as though those contrasts were as developed as they could be to make this film more thought provoking and profound. The film was most definitely intended to be uplifting and "warm fuzzy"-inducing, but rather I felt more annoyed than anything after the film ended.

b-smith_12 As it is in Heaven is a beautiful story about how one person can have a huge impact on the lives and relationships of others. It is a film about people overcoming obstacles, learning to do what they love, and coming together over one thing, music. This movie is very well made and it is one that will have the viewer very emotionally invested. The movie starts out by following a man named Daniel Daréus, who is a very gifted musician and a world famous conductor. Unfortunately for him he has a medical condition that eventually forces him to give up his job as a conductor, because it places too much stress on his body. Daniel decides to move back to the very small Norwegian town that he grew up in, and he purchases the old school building as his new home. The people in the town, especially the folks in the local church choir are very excited to have Daniel in town because they think he can help them. However, Daniel is not very receptive to that idea at first, but after finally agreeing to listen to them sing, he realizes that they very good, and agrees to help them. Before rehearsing any songs that they are going to sing Daniel teaches them the importance of things such as balance and harmony. He works with a host of different personalities and voices, but he eventually manages to pull it all together and make it work. At the end the choir ends of performing in a big singing contest in Austria, and they put on a very moving performance. One theme is this movie seems to be angels, or guardian angels. At the beginning of the film we saw Daniel as a young boy getting beat up by some bullies because he was a little different from them. It turns out one of those bullies, Conny, was married to Gabriella, a very talented singer in the choir. She was also getting abused by Conny, and everyone, including Daniel knew about it. After realizing early in the film that he would not be able to physically restrain Conny from hurting Gabriella, and seeing that she was too afraid to leave him, Daniel wrote a song for Gabriella to sing at their performance that was intended to make her feel like a strong and independent woman. She was not receptive to it initially, but she ended up putting on a great performance which eventually gave her the strength and confidence to leave Conny. Daniel, with help from all the others in the choir, helped give Gabriella the strength to do this because they were sort of her guardian angels. We also see Daniel play the same role for Inger, who is struggling in her relationship with Stig. Daniel helps Inger to find what it is that makes her happy and what she has to do to accomplish that. Another example of this is Daniel's relationship to Lena. Daniel is infatuated with Lena the first time he sees her, and he is very moved by her singing voice. After eventually building their relationship, Daniel begins to get scared because he has never really loved anybody and he doesn't feel like he knows how. Lena teaches him how to love not only her, but everyone in the choir, and she helps Daniel find happiness before he dies. Another theme in this film is overcoming fear. As mentioned, Daniel overcomes his fear of intimacy and learns how to love. Lena overcomes her fear of being hurt like she was with her previous boyfriend and learns to love and trust Daniel. Inger finally gains the courage to speak up against her pastor husband about her beliefs on sin, religion, and their relationship. Gabriella overcomes her fear of Conny and eventually stands up for herself and leaves him. Another example would be Holmfird's character, who has taken abuse from Arne his whole life but finally stands up for himself. There are many other examples in this movie of people overcoming their fears, and that seems to be one of the overall themes of the film. There are many different themes in this film and several very important and complicated relationships that are followed. Overall I think that this film was very well done and I really enjoyed it. I would say my favorite part was when Gabriella was performing her solo. She has such a beautiful voice and the message of the song was so strong that it gave me chills. There were a few parts that I didn't like so much but for the most part I thought the film was great. One of the better Nordic films that I have seen.