Who, may you ask, is Dina? She's the nineteenth-century daughter (played by Maria Bonnevie) of a stern patriarch who has never forgiven her for accidentally killing her mother when she was a child. This, naturally, has had an adverse effect on her emotional life, and between visions of her protective mother she grows to be a defiant and passionate young woman. Unfortunately, this is a man's world, and her bitter father marries her off to a much older business associate (Gerard Depardieu); but when he dies of gangrenous leg (with a little help from a mindful Dina), she inherits his land and property and become lady of the house. This sets the stage for Leo Zjukovskiij (Christopher Eccleston) to come in and steal her heart; who's to mind if he's an anarchist plotting revolution?

That's the short version. In reality, I Am Dina's plot is ennobled by the world "convoluted" and as such features much incident, family intrigue, shouting, and lots and lots of sex. Death by a cauldron of lye? Yes. Snobbish rapist in-laws? Check. Raising of children with the help? Better believe it--Dina packs several lifetimes into her stay on film, and director Ole Bornedal (both versions of Nightwatch) captures it all brilliantly. The heated bodice-ripping of the narrative finds its equal in Bornedal's style: not only does it receive some sensuous, lip-smacking cinematography by Dan Laustssen, which heightens the physicality of the heroine's rampage across the screen, but its editing style helps it race from episode to episode instead of quietly observing. This makes one appreciate the action instead of the costume--the film is happily concerned with the intensity of the narrative, meaning that the "civilized" genre of the costume drama is merrily chucked out a stained-glass window.

Alas, the film does that job a little too well, and by the end of this breakneck film, I was pining for a bit of quiet reflection on its heroine's lust for life. When moral issues are raised, they're never truly answered--matters such as Dina's bearing of children with a stable-hand and then ignoring the child are barely touched upon, and her misogynist class-bound son-in-law is a little too obvious to be anything other than a straw man. There's also the matter of the bet-hedging involved in Dina's conception: she's shrewdly designed as part-feminist heroine and part-male-masochist fantasy girl, and never develops a personality beyond her assertiveness and frequent naked flesh. Good films temper their bodies with their souls, but I Am Dina doesn't have one--just a sexy technique and subject that gets the party started.-Travis Hoover