Melancholia

Lars von Trier, 2011 (8.4*)
This is a rarity among films, a science fiction film that has little to do, really, with that aspect of the story. Instead, the fact that a hidden planet has emerged from behind the sun and is heading on a path toward earth really is little more than a metaphor for the characters psychogically complex stories.

Von Trier has created his most mesmerizing film to date, full of dreamy, surrealistic images more reminiscent of painters like Magritte, De Chirico, and Dali, than any film references (see film still at the bottom) – except perhaps early Antonioni. 

Kirsten Dunst won five acting awards for her gutsy portrayal of a newlywed bride mired in her own melancholia, and whose dysfunctional personality seems to deteriorate as the planet, named Melancholia, moves closer to earth. Charlotte Gainsbourg plays her long-suffering sister, who seems determined to take care of her sister in spite of the apparent hopelessness of the situation, as her personal demons seems to have no cause or origin.

Like most of von Trier’s films, this one is also slow to develop, and eerily like a Bergman film of introspection and inner turmoil, and may not hold the attention of the average viewer, but if you stick with this one you will be surprised and rewarded, I believe, especially in comparison to his other efforts. This is the type of film rated higher by critics (80 at Metacritics) vs fans (7.2 at IMDB), but those are often the more unique and unforgettable films, as critics see so many of the mundane variety that it takes something different to wake them up from mediocrity.

One of the many surrealistic and artistic images in Melancholia

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The Seventh Seal

[This is our 700th film reviewed]
Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, 1957, bw (9.2*)
Though not particularly pleasant viewing as it deals with a dying world amid a plague, this is probably Bergman's masterpiece, and a film that generally goes beyond cinema and into the realm of mythic art. Max Von Sydow plays a medieval knight returning home, who is trying to escape the bubonic plague with his family.

He is constantly shadowed by death, the Grim Reaper (Bengt Ekerot, as the most compelling character in the film) who tells him its time - a pale faced figure in a black cloak with whom he plays an ongoing game of chess for his life [see photo below], with whom he discusses life and death and God. Full of moody, gothic, yet beautiful black and white images, the film almost seems to be medieval paintings in motion. The overfall effect of this film is hypnotic; Bergman was at the height of his directing eye in composing these frames. I'm not usually a Bergman fan (his films are sometimes more painful than a trip to the dentist, and often longer, without the same positive result), but this film is easy to recommend. I'm just rating it down a notch from perfect because it's just so grim a story.

This is one of just three films that Woody Allen said went "beyond cinema and became art" - the other two being Antonioni's L'avventura (1960) and Renoir's La Grande Illusion (1937).

The famous chess match with the Grim Reaper

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Under the Sun

aka Under Solen
Colin Nutley, 1998, Sweden (9.5*)
An extreme rarity: an uplifting love story, and from Sweden no less. In this surprisingly simple story (from a novel by H.E. Bates), a lonely Swedish farmer, believably portrayed by Rolf Lassgard, who shared the family house with his now deceased mother places a newspaper ad for a live-in housekeeper. His simple and idyllic lifestyle is dramatically changed when the ad is answered by a beautiful and mature blond woman, perfectly cast by the director's wife Helena Bergstrom. When she doesn't immediately run away and moves in, his best male friend (Johan Widerberg) is both jealous and suspicious.

This film has many pleasant surprises, especially compared to classic romance films of the past, and when compared to the emotional angst prevalent in nearly all famous Swedish films, such as those of Ingmar Bergman. Here the nearly primitive pastoral setting is juxtaposed with the coming rock and roll age, as his young friend is a big fan of American rock and the new attitude shaking the world's more conservative traditions. There is a tension cleverly set up between the three by director Nutley, and an unsettling undercurrent that belies the pleasant romance occurring on the surface. I won't spoil any surprises for the viewers here, just make this a must-see foreign film and you'll be glad you braved the subtitles.

I love the metaphor of the silent airplane used in the film's opening, there's a forum discussion about this at IMDB for those interested in researching this film after viewing.

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