The Danish Girl is the kind of cocky drama where the filmmakers so blatantly vy for award recognition that they forget to make a good film. About one of the first transgender individuals to go through gender reassignment surgery, The Danish Girl relies heavily on its subject matter, disregarding entertainment value and strong character development.

Oscar-winner Eddie Redmayne and Alicia Vikander star as married couple Gerda and Einar Wegener, whose relationship is put to the test when Einar discovers that he would prefer to be a woman named Lili Elbe.

It makes for some awkward dinners.

Though I’d never heard of her, Lili Elbe is understandably one of the most well known individuals among transgender people. It’s not an easy thing for a lot of people to fully understand, myself included, but The Danish Girl does a good job of showing how Einar becomes Lili Elbe. A fellow critic, who is transgender, confirmed in her review that The Danish Girl accurately represents the emotions and challenges of going through a gender transformation.

She also had quite a few issues with the movie as whole, however, and I agree. Redmayne is good in the lead role and Vikander is terrific, but the movie never really takes off. After the initial half hour, director Tom Cooper and screenwriter Lucinda Coxon offer little reason to keep watching: the movie slogs along with very few dramatic spikes or interesting moments. The film becomes a standard if not bland biopic, strange given that the movie allegedly takes a lot of artistic license with Elbe’s life story anyway.

The Danish Girl isn’t a terrible movie, but unless you are specifically interested in Lili Elbe’s story, there’s not a lot of entertainment value here.

Review by Erik Samdahl unless otherwise indicated.