In Theaters and On Demand: Melancholia

Melancholia

Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg deliver outstanding performances as the two sisters at the center of Lars von Trier's latest cinematic masterpiece.

This has to be the best new release I have seen in years… really. I was totally intrigued and taken in by Lars von Trier last film, Antichrist, but not as convinced by its story, its characters, or the way events and images played out. Too over the top. Too forced. However, in Melancholia, Trier delivers a certain subtlety that saves the terse actions and emotions from falling into the absurd. These people feel real, palpable, and alive; Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg give us knock-out performances as the two sister female leads Justine and Claire. Meanwhile, Kiefer Sutherland is kind of brilliant as Claire's grave yet likable voice of reason husband and Alexander Skarsgard shows that he can be much more than a seductive vampire as Justine's appealing groom. Then we have the wonderful parents! Or, rather, wonderfully self-involved - but Charlotte Rampling is unnerving as the ferocious, unstable mother who refuses to give easy love (and John Hurt works well as the distracted, merry father).

So the actors are all in place, perfectly situated, perfectly directed by a Trier who here seems to know exactly what he wants. And he knows where to put them. The places are fantastical yet pulse with life and doom. The horses are warning signs, like Nietzsche's turin horse. The colors fluctuate according to mood, the music is in tune with the players' emotions, fears, and desires. Parts I and II are perfectly complimentary, neither being one thing or the other, but both secretly hiding the end that is to come, that always feels near. Trier has painted a wonderful portrait of the apocalypse that always feels imminent in life. We know that when the world ends, we most likely will already have been extinct, yet there is something terrifying and fitting that we should have to witness it, and bear it, and know that it is happening and we have no power to stop it. 

The four lovers of Melancholia anxiously enjoy the wedding day as they gaze up at the coming planet.

I cannot get the images out of my mind: the slow motion of despair; the calm sky melting into the Earth, ravishing it; Gainsbourg and Dunst's faces, sad, reconciled, afraid; horses riding into wilderness, carrying two of nature's lost children; a masquerade of a wedding, with dancing and promises of happiness that won't last; a white wedding dress soaking in a bathtub, leaking out its lies; a breakfast table and star gazing, a slight wind, excitement that is really stifled terror.

This is a one of a kind film and it should be enjoyed and valued by anyone. It moves so swiftly and calmly, and yet there's nothing but a frenetic anticipation that underlies it. It won't bore; it will only engage, move from emotion to emotion, mental state to mental state; all the while staying true to Trier's overarching narrative, beautifully intact.