The Green Butchers (2003) - 20th Anniversary Screening

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As part of our CUFF 2023 Retrospective, see THE GREEN BUTCHERS (2003) as a Double Feature with ADAM'S APPLES (2005), including a live-zoom Q&A with Director Anders Thomas Jensen after the first film (THE GREEN BUTCHERS).

In this dark absurdist comedy from CUFF alumnus Anders Thomas Jensen (MEN & CHICKEN, RIDERS OF JUSTICE), business really starts to pick up for two Danish friends after they accidentally sell a dead electrician as marinated "chicken" at their new butcher shop. Bjarne and Svend are pals. Svend has great ambition driven by an equally great inferiority complex, while Bjarne hardly cares about anything at all apart from his girlfriend. Starting their own butcher's shop enables them to escape from their vicious boss, but the shop doesn't do well until a bizarre coincidence leads Svend to concoct a new dish for the organic butcher shop. Business takes off, but will they still be able to obtain the ingredients for this special dish? A comedy that combines the trite, the morbid and the amusing.

OFFICIAL SELECTION
Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2003
Toronto International Film Festival 2003
AFI Fest 2003

DIRECTOR'S BIO
Anders Thomas Jensen is a screenwriter and director from Denmark. In high school he met Tomas Villum Jensen and together they made the short ERNST & THE LIGHT (1996), which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Short Film, Live Action. Jensen’s second short film, WOLFGANG (1997) was also nominated, and in 1999, he won the Academy Award with ELECTION NIGHT. In 2000 he made his first feature film, FLICKERING LIGHTS, followed by THE GREEN BUTCHERS (2003). After ADAM’S APPLES (2005), he took a 10-year break from directing, before returning with MEN & CHICKEN (2015), and then RIDERS OF JUSTICE (2020). Jensen often collaborates with the actors Mads Mikkelsen and Nikolaj Lie Kaas.