"Like ER on acid," claimed one critic writing about the 1994 first series of Lars von Trier's horror-satire TV miniseries, which follows the lives, loves, and squabbles of Danish doctors and nurses and a visiting Swedish neurologist (who periodically goes to the rooftop to scream "Danish scum!") at Kingdom Hospital. The 1997 second series picks up right where the first left off, with a hypochondriac would-be Miss Marple with a taste for the occasional séance continuing to try to solve the mystery of a little girl ghost whose “little brother”—the newborn grotesque offspring of the demon doctor Aage Krüger (Udo Keir, who also plays the oversized baby)—may hold the key to the dark secrets of the Kingdom. While the second series involves more over-the-top storytelling and less of the genuine spine-chilling frisson of the initial episodes, there's still much to appreciate here in the offbeat humor captured in the day-to-day backbiting office politics of the hospital staff. Just like the first series, the second ends abruptly with several narrative threads left hanging, but as Von Trier notes in one of the brief audio commentaries, many of the principal cast are now dead, making it unlikely that a third series will be filmed (American viewers were treated to an inferior knockoff in Stephen King's short-lived 2004 series Kingdom Hospital). Sporting a purposefully grainy look, DVD extras on this double-disc set compiling all four second-series episodes include a documentary on Von Trier (featuring a fascinating interview with the director) and a pointless Kingdom-inspired music video. Recommended. (R. Pitman)
The Kingdom: Series Two
Koch Lorber, 2 discs, 291 min., in Danish w/English subtitles, not rated, $29.98 Volume 23, Issue 2
The Kingdom: Series Two
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