Visionary Danish filmmaker and notorious provocateur Lars von Trier has done some impressive work in the past decade, including his great, lacerating allegory of American exclusion Dogville, and his only recent misfire is that 2004 film's dramatically unsatisfying sequel Manderlay, which still contains enough daring ideas to make it worthwhile viewing for von Trier completists. But his latest film, the intimate epic Melancholia (2011, Lars von Trier) (opening 11/11 in limited release and on Video On Demand), stands as his most stunning and full-bodied cinematic achievement since Breaking the Waves.
Von Trier has spent the 15 years since that emotionally devastating masterpiece trying to distance himself from its heart-on-the-sleeve romanticism, whether intentionally or not. Sure, Dancer in the Dark is moving enough to almost be an exception, but its academic interest in dissecting the American movie musical and its jarringly graphic execution climax seemed to signal the direction von Trier was heading in for the remainder of the 21st century's inaugural decade. Von Trier's output in this period contained enough refined artistry and probing depth to keep his "bad boy" edginess from growing stale or seeming immature, but he was so interested in pushing the envelope of good taste with these films as to make emotional engagement with them difficult verging on impossible.
While it's unlikely that the pure uplift of Breaking the Waves' final scene will ever factor into von Trier's work again, Melancholia boasts a palpable humanity and emotional texture that has been noticeably lacking in even the best of the director's post-Waves films. Nothing remotely gross or hard-to-take occurs in the film, and that freedom from shock tactics has loosened von Trier up to such a degree that, for the first time in a while, he's made a movie that works first and foremost as a wonderful character drama. The high style, elements of genre subversion, and deep well of subtext that we've come to expect from von Trier are really just icing on the cake here.
But oh my, what icing! Von Trier opens the film with an eight-minute-long coup de cinema likely to cause even the most jaded cinephile to go slack-jawed in wonderment. A series of precisely framed images play out in extreme slow-motion, depicting a planet destructively colliding with Earth and a handful of characters we haven't yet met reacting to the storm-like chaos of the collision in a variety of different ways.
Von Trier then shifts gears from the effects-driven, classical-music-scored surrealism of this positively orgasmic prologue to a gracefully handheld, character-centered approach as the story proper begins. At this point, the planet that we know from the prologue will eventually cause the end of life on Earth as we know it is dismissed as just a star, certainly nothing to disrupt the wedding of Justine (Kirsten Dunst), an ad copywriter with a history of severe depression, to her well-intentioned beau, Michael (a charming Alexander Skarsgard).
The greatest threat to the nuptials is Justine's mercurial emotional state. She is sincere in her assertion to Michael that she will try to stay happy at the wedding reception. But that's a tall order considering the reception's guest list: Justine's former boss, Jack (Stellan Skarsgard), who is uninterested in disguising his zeal to win his star employee back; her long-divorced, frequently bickering parents (John Hurt and Charlotte Rampling); and her understanding-to-a-point, long-suffering sister, Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), accompanied by temperamental husband John (Kiefer Sutherland).
The bustling, ensemble-powered humanity and dark comedy derived from social awkwardness that defines this reception set piece, which takes up a little over half of the movie, is reminiscent of Robert Altman's A Wedding, fellow Dane Thomas Vinterberg's The Celebration, and Jonathan Demme's Rachel Getting Married. It's a testament to von Trier's gifts that he's able to guide the onscreen festivities with as sure a hand as those other estimable directors.
Then, he shifts gears yet again, demonstrating that he's more than able to retain his ability to surprise even while restraining his impulse to shock. The movie jumps forward in time to show that forbidding planet, now called Melancholia, moving ever closer to Earth, as Justine and Claire each deal with the inevitability of death in their own different ways. This part of the film is an art-house riff on the sci-fi genre in much the same way that von Trier's last film, Antichrist, acted as an art-house take on the horror genre (the voluptuous prologue, crayon-scrawled title/director card, and presence of Gainsbourg also offer intriguing overlaps with Antichrist, although those scarred for life by that film's graphic sexual violence can be assured that this is a far more restrained film).
The sum total of what von Trier has pulled off with his audacious stylistic and narrative shifts is artistically breathtaking, and open to discussion as to the underlying meaning(s). Since von Trier has openly discussed the mighty battle with crippling depression that led him to create Antichrist, it's easy to see the character of Justine in Melancholia as a symbolic stand-in for the director. But then, is he using Justine to metaphorically compare Melancholia's fatal trajectory with a promising young talent's loss to an overpowering inner darkness (this and The Tree of Life, the two best films I've seen this year so far, both juxtapose the cosmic and the human in thematically fertile ways), or is the character a sly justification of pessimism as an entirely logical viewpoint? (On yet another level, the movie seems to allegorically address the climate-change debate, pointedly casting Sutherland--hero Jack Bauer from right-wing small-screen favorite 24--as a conservative naysayer.)
Still, as rewarding as it is to read into Melancholia, the film succeeds most as an intimate, finely detailed character study. Von Trier has been accused of misogyny in the past (which I think is overly reductive, though it's not like I'm unable to see where those charges are coming from), but his connection to Dunst's Justine is strong and empathic. Dunst responds with a performance of keen emotional intuition, the best of her career to date. Every minute flicker of feeling that passes over Dunst's face is easily discernible to the viewer; we eventually can tell the difference between Justine's real smiles and those she merely puts on in a game effort to fit in. Another major achievement of von Trier and Dunst's collaboration is how disturbingly accurate they are in capturing real, exhausting depression.
As the family member best equipped to deal with Justine when she hits an emotional nadir, Gainsbourg is remarkably subtle and complex in suggesting Claire's occasional difficulty in summoning the appropriate compassion to help keep Justine from sinking into the abyss. She obviously wouldn't be the first actress to come to mind as a physically credible sister to Dunst (if von Trier had nabbed his first choice for the Justine role, Penelope Cruz, the sibling casting would've raised even more eyebrows), but she and Dunst forge such a believable and unique emotional bond onscreen as to render such concerns needlessly superficial. In a just world, both would be major contenders in this year's Best Actress Oscar race (Dunst has already garnered the Best Actress award from the Cannes Film Festival, though this film isn't typical Oscar fare, to put it mildly).
The two leads also benefit from the back-up provided by a sterling supporting cast. Hurt and Rampling are as formidable as ever; a scene in which their characters verbally assault each other at the wedding reception could legitimately be shown in acting classes. And the elder Skarsgard is in prime creep mode; he gets a sublime throwaway bit where his character angrily tosses his plate of food against the side of a catering truck only to deny his hissyfit the moment he realizes he was caught in the act. Sutherland is the only one here who doesn't quite fit in, but von Trier is wise enough to use his weirdly overamped intensity to comedic effect.
With one of von Trier's best ensembles and an eloquently articulated sense of end-times despair, Melancholia would be ideally primed to win over those who've been staying away from the director's recent work...were it not for von Trier's jackass decision to play the "bad boy" at the film's Cannes press conference, jokingly admitting that he feels a kinship with Adolf Hitler and making other cracks that someone unfamiliar with his interview schtick might interpret as anti-Semitic. Of course, those used to his routine know that he was being knowing and insincere--an imp with a questionable sense of humor and zero sense of public decorum. I agree with another of the film's big fans (I do forget which critic at the moment) that after making a film as relatively restrained and uncomfortably personal as Melancholia, von Trier most likely felt a psychological need to create division among the cinephile ranks once again. It surely can't feel safe for someone of his unusual mindset to bare his soul in a film that's entirely free of the transgressive jolts that he has come to use as a kind of stylistic defense mechanism. But I'm sure as hell glad he did. Melancholia's doom may be more crushing than the tears-inspiring catharsis of Breaking the Waves, but both offer the rare spectacle of a master filmmaker in full command of his formal and narrative powers. Grade: A
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