What can I say? I’m a sucker for period drama, especially if it involves Colin Firth, stunning dresses and a grand English mansion. No, really – what could be better than a decadent manor house, gorgeous 20’s fashion and a brooding Colin Firth to top it all off?

Scandinavian films aren’t exactly known to portray the world from a joyful, lighthearted perspective. Maybe it’s something to do with the short and grey winter days, or the hardworking social welfare systems that end up keeping everybody sort of ‘same-same’. Denmark and Sweden usually rank highly in lists of suicide rates, Finland hosted it’s latest in a spate of school shootings a few months ago and semi-Scandi Iceland is in economic turmoil.

As the lights dim, I wonder about just what it is that I have gotten myself into. The crowd hushes, and the opening scenes begin. A man taps at a typewriter as he narrates in first person what he was doing on the day the twin towers of the World Trade Centre came down. A TV sits in the corner of his lounge room replaying those key scenes of the planes hitting the buildings, as the man explains the consequences of the event on the state of the world. I find myself agreeing with his words and their loaded yet honest truth.

I’m a huge fan of tapas. You know, the brilliant little titbits of all sorts of yummy goodness, authentically Spanish or otherwise? Fun to share, fun to eat, and if you stumble upon one you’re not so crash hot on, don’t worry – in a bite or two it will all be over and you can move onto the next one!