Male anxiety, inadequacy and victimhood: Insecure and immature men in recent Norwegian cinema

This article examines white heterosexual men in five recent Norwegian films that expose them as anxious and immature. These films mirror wider trends in the evaluation of white male failure and inadequacy across western cinemas since the mid-2000s. Extending critical discourses on ‘crises of masculinity’, especially in US film, this article finds in these films the ambivalent legacy of enforced gender politics in Norway over the last four decades. More specifically, they focus on Norwegian male complaints and ambivalence towards societal developments in favour of gender equality. Male characters exploit the opportunities of sexual liberation. They simultaneously objectify and neurotically fear women. A multitude of mental and physical ‘ailments’ establishes the men as victims. In an attempt to reclaim destabilized masculinities, parents and sexualized women are demonized. Ultimately, however, the desire to contain female sexuality and the transition into (hetero)sexual maturity is frustrated, and male anxieties remain unrelieved and unresolved.