At this year’s Academy Award the Danish film ‘Another Round’ brought home the golden statue for Best Foreing Film. Not only is it an award-winning movie but the soundtrack has also gotten quite the buzz – especially the single delivered by the Danish band Scarlet Pleasure.

By Henriette Søvsø Szocska

The small room is filled with people excited to hear more about the award-winning movie and the thoughts behind the choice of music. Editor Anne Østerud, Producer Kasper Dissing and Music Supervisor Mikkel Maltha worked closely together with director Thomas Vinterberg on ‘Another Round’. And now they are at SPOT+ to tell about the music behind the movie.

If you have seen the movie or listened to the radio, you probably already know the song ‘What a Life’ by Danish pop-trio Scarlet Pleasure – a song which features in both the trailer and several times in the movie. The song was found after many months of searching through thousands of songs from all different genres.

“We had to find a song that matched Mads’ (edt. Mikkelsen) ecstatic dance scene and the mood of the movie. It had to be perfect,” said Mikkel Maltha and continued: “It wasn’t actually us who found the song. It was Vinterberg’s wife.”

Originally it wasn’t ’What a Life’ that was intended for the iconic dance scene at the end of the movie. On the contrary it was more likely to end with a number from the American singer Billie Eilish but that project crashed quickly. “We actually did get the green light from Billie Eilish to use a song from her but the budget wasn’t cut for that,” said Anne Østerud with a smile.

But luckily Scarlet Pleasure was more than ready to let their song be a part of the movie. They allowed the team to modify and play with the song so it would fit perfectly into the scene. “It ended up being the absolutely closest creative work we have ever had with an artist,” said Mikkel Maltha in the closing sentence of the session.

Photo: Allan Niss