What happens when you mix reindeer herders, family secrets, and a 3,000-person wedding planned in a month? This riotous comedy-drama is both heartfelt and hilarious; a chaotic celebration of culture, kin, love, and imperfection.
Weddings are never just about the bride and groom. In Åse Kathrin Vuolab’s sharp, hilarious, and deeply resonant series, the ceremony is only the tip of the iceberg. Set in Kautokeino in northern Norway, A Sámi Wedding centres on Garen (Sara Margrethe Oskal), a weary middle-aged woman who is stuck in a loveless marriage and the de facto matriarch of a lower-income family, perched at the bottom of the town’s social ladder.
When her son announces he’s marrying into a powerful reindeer-herding family, Garen sees a shot at social redemption if only she can pull off the perfect traditional wedding — for 3,000 guests — in a month. Unfortunately, her three younger siblings are at odds with her ambitions and often with each other. To make matters worse, Garen’s longtime nemesis — the groom’s future mother-in-law, a woman of privilege — seems eager to draw attention to her every shortcoming.
With the chaotic energy of Shameless and the charming messiness of My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Vuolab crafts a generous ensemble piece full of biting humour, familial chaos, and pointed cultural insight. The characters are flawed, loud, loving, and deeply unforgettable, highlighted by a magnetic lead performance by Oskal (returning to TIFF following her feature directorial debut The Tundra Within Me in 2023).
Vuolab resists easy sentiment. What emerges instead is something more satisfying: a raw, funny, and honest portrait of intergenerational care, cultural expectation, and the mess we call family.
JASON RYLE
Screenings
Scotiabank 9
Scotiabank 13
Scotiabank 5