Vicino alla Montagna - Information page

Nature is constantly present | Music perpetually sounds from beyond the mountains

Humankind arises from earth while Music is directing the cycle of life | Nature is the impartial arena

What happens when Humankind cannot relate to this unified energy of Nature and Music?

Foreign Titles: English: NEAR THE MOUNTAINS | Norwegian: NÆR FJELLET

      

Park City Film Music Festival, Utah, USA, May 26, 2011

Park City Film Music Festival, Utah, USA, May 26, 2011, screening & winner: 

Jury Choice - Gold Medal for Musical Excellence in a Performance/Expermental Film for the film Vicino alla Montagna. Composer Fred Jonny Berg / Director Fred Jonny Berg.

(...) This is a massively beautiful work encased in less than an hour. The instrumental music by Fred Jonny Berg is the centerpiece and framework of the film. Artistic nudity prevails in one section, Stunning scenery is captured throughout (...) (From the festival program).

American International Film Festival, February 2011, winner:

Best director, composer and photographer.

International Filmmaker Festival 2011, Official selection category "Best Music Film"

Movie soundtracks (from the album Flute Mystery) nominated for a Grammy 2010

Vicino alla Montagna - Production trailer (2006).

Listen to a selection of movie soundtracks:

  Listen to "Vicino alla Montagna"

  Listen to "Pastorale"

  Listen to "Waltz of the Queen"

  Listen to "Warning Zero"

Vicino alla Montagna is a music and art movie in the proprietary genre Symbiophonies - made by composer and director Fred Jonny Berg.

According to Berg, the film is unusual because it uses original, melodious music without verbal action, as well as a set of fictions to underpin the epical in the script.

One of the main principles in the Symbiophonies genre is that the inner nature of the music is equal to the visual aspect, and this entity incites much of the action. Therefore, some alternative aesthetical choices in relation to the scores and sounds have to be made.

The music can be perceived as both melodious and dramatic and is performed by a group of chamber musicians with the pianist Wolfgang Plagge at the head, as well as one the world's foremost orchestras, the Philharmonia Orchestra from England, conducted by Fred Jonny Berg.

The film contains nudity for artistic purposes, and has been awarded a general certificate (open for all ages) from the Norwegian Media Authority.

- This is not surprising and confirms the script's intentions. The human nudity is set in a natural framework in relation to nature and music, which can also be seen as being naked, says director Fred Jonny Berg. - It would be a logical break if some elements are dressed in this production, Berg continues.

- The film is suitable for all age groups, but is perhaps best suited to young people and adults when it comes to being able to interpret the action, Berg explains.

Director´s Statement

Fred Jonny Berg - Biography

Photo: "Misty walk" - from Vicino alla Montagna.
Director: Fred Jonny Berg. Photo: Tomas Evjen.

Credits

Director, script, music & editing: Fred Jonny Berg

Director of photography: Tomas Evjen

Executive producer: Symbiophonic AS

Producer & Copyright 20©10: Composer AS

Co-producer & Technical producer: News on Request AS

Cast: The Nature, The Music, Rebekka Nystabakk & Mona Solhaug

Soundtrack performed by Tom Ottar Andreassen, Håvard Daae Rognli, Wolfgang Plagge & Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Fred Jonny Berg

Age limit: Open for all (general certificate from the Norwegian Media Authority)

Screening format: DCP, Blu-ray, DVD - 16:9, 5.1 surround sound or 2.0 stereo

Pre-premiere November 12, 2009, 4 PM at Curzon Soho Cinema, London, England, with invited guests
Official premiere at Nordlysfestivalen 2012

Fred Jonny Berg: Director, Manager, Print Return, Print Shipper

Other credits: See movie credits

Rebekka Nystabakk and Fred Jonny Berg (2009)

Festivals, cinemas, film clubs or arenas within education or science:

For a small rental fee, you can rent Vicino alla Montagna for different purposes. High quality Blu-ray or DVD master copies with sound options 5.1. surround or 2.0 stereo are available for rental.

Vicino alla Montagna - Rental information

Awards & Screenings

    

Park City Film Music Festival, Utah, USA, May 26, 2011

Park City Film Music Festival, Utah, USA, May 26, 2011, screening & winner: 

Jury Choice - Gold Medal for Musical Excellence in a Performance/Expermental Film for the film Vicino alla Montagna. Composer Fred Jonny Berg / Director Fred Jonny Berg.

(...) This is a massively beautiful work encased in less than an hour. The instrumental music by Fred Jonny Berg is the centerpiece and framework of the film. Artistic nudity prevails in one section, Stunning scenery is captured throughout (...) (From the festival program).

American International Film Festival, February 2011, winner:

Best director, composer and photographer.

International Filmmaker Festival 2011, Official selection category "Best Music Film"

Movie soundtracks (from the album Flute Mystery) nominated for a Grammy 2010

Nordlysfestivalen, Norway, January 30 and 31, 2012

It's a major happening when Fred Jonny Berg's masterpiece "Vicino alla Montagna" ("Close to the mountain") has its world premiere at Nordlysfestivalen. The already critically acclaimed art movie is a symbiosis of different art forms, a "symbiophony" as the artist himself has chosen to call it; Blending visual impressions from nature with original music compositions and actors performing speechless actions, he has succeeded in creating a breathtaking aesthetic experience.
Vicino alla Montagna provides us with magnificent and touching images of the majestic scenery in the North. Along with the music and the acting we are taken on a journey back to the originating and unspoiled. We meet two human beings that unprotected and naked encounter nature - and gradually learn to live in it. The journey is beautiful, rough and eye-opening.

(...) (From the festival program).

Reviews

The film music soundtrack performed by the Philharmonia Orchestra is from the album Flute Mystery and was Grammy nominated in the category Best Surround Sound Album 2010.

Flute Mystery – Fred Jonny Berg

Emily Beynon, flute 
Catherine Beynon, harp 

Philharmonia Orchestra
Vladimir Ashkenazy

Flute Mystery Op.66 is dedicated to Sir James Galway

In Vicino alla Montagna, the soundtracks are from the releases Seasons of Life & Flute Mystery

- Vicino alla Montagna' doesn't only sound like a movie score, it actually is the music to a film with the same title. Again Berg paints whole landscapes with his music; in this case we are taken to the mountains. I have not seen the movie, but I imagine his intent was not merely to describe a beautiful mountain view, but to show us a powerful panorama that reminds us of how little influence we can take over nature. A remarkable composition. Blu-rayDefinition.com, 2009

- Fred Jonny Berg is a major musical discovery. It would be necessary to rewind to the 1940s and Malcolm Arnold to find an emerging composer of such exceeding promise. His compositions are confidently tonal, fluently melodious and possessed of virtually supernatural penetrative power. The flute works receive achingly beautiful, indeed enchanting, performances from Emily Beynon and the Philharmonia under Vladimir Ashkenazy (Berg conducts the other pieces). This set is recommended for any collector seeking the refined side of contemporary music. La Scena, Canada, 2009

- Fred Jonny Berg as pictorial artist is also abundantly present in his music – Vicino alla Montagna Op.58b is music to a film with the same title. Berg paints landscape panoramas with a steady, sure hand. And, from his point of view as a film maker, he seeks long lines in the artistic discourse – like Richard Strauss in his Alpensinfonie he uses the entire expressive register of the orchestra to describe the magnificent peaks in all their inward and outward facets. Unlike Strauss, however, Berg's portrayal is darker and more stringent: we are certainly not in the Alps, rather in the weatherbeaten mountains of northern Norway where nature, not man, decides. Wolfgang Plagge

- The film music Vicino alla Montagna is a dark rendering of Nordic mountaineers at the mercy of mother nature and only brightened up with a good-humored interlude. 6moons, 2010

Read reviews of the movie soundtracks

Background information

Director's Statement

Synopsis

Release information

Trailer

 

Fred Jonny Berg - IMDb

 

Details - IMDb

 

Demo Reel - IMDb (please choose "720p HD" for optimal performance)

Soundtrack Grammy nominated

Vicino alla Montagna - Rental information

   

 

A selection of the storyboard drawings. Every scene was planned in detail before the filming.

Press releases

Press release #2 30.10.2009 *.doc (Word)

Press release #2 30.10.2009 HTML-version
Press release #1 Summer 2009

Press photos

Vicino alla Montagna - Poster

Vicino alla Montagna - Film Grab 1
Vicino alla Montagna - Film Grab 2
Vicino alla Montagna - Film Grab 3
Vicino alla Montagna - Film Grab 4 Rebekka Nystabakk (actor)
Vicino alla Montagna - Film Crew
Vicino alla Montagna - Fred Jonny Berg (director)

Photo credits for all film shots: 

Photo: Tomas Evjen, News on Request AS

Photo credits for photo of Fred Jonny Berg:
Photo: News on Request AS

Sponsors

Musique de film et de l'art par le compositeur Fred Jonny Berg. Nous nous réunissons deux êtres humains que la nature rencontre non protégés et nu - et peu à peu apprendre à vivre en elle.

WARNING

Non-authorized use of the photos, trailer, posters, movie content or other material from Vicino alla Montagna without mentioning of the film - or the film's plot - is strictly prohibited and may be prosecuted. Further inquiries: post@fredjonnyberg.com

Vicino alla Montagna Copyright 20©12 Composer AS