Movie Review : Melancholia (2011)
People like Lars Von Trier are important. They are imperfect, but important nonetheless. Unfortunately, he is the kind of person we will better understand the importance and relevance of when he's going to shuffle off his mortal coil, like a talented, charismatic and profoundly self-absorbed professional athlete. The Danish film director has managed to keep his artistic integrity in a time where everything and everyone is for sale and he could be writing toilet paper commercials that would still be an exploit. He's always been a hit-and-miss director for me (sometimes to a point of making me lose my shit), but he always tries really hard to knock it out of the park. Melancholia is one of the high points of his career. It's a beautiful, deceptively intimate movie about the end of worlds.
Melancholia is structured around two distinct parts. Justine happens solely on the night of Justine (Kirsten Dunst)'s wedding. She is treated to a lavish, princess-like reception, paid by her sister Claire (the talented Charlotte Gainsbourg) and her husband John (Kiefer Sutherland) Justine should be happy, but she is not and she doesn't understand what is wrong with her. She tries her best to sabotage the reception until she alienates everyone, loses her job and her husband Michael (Alexander Skarsgard) actually walks out on her.
Claire picks up a couple weeks/months later, still on Claire and John's estate, Justine is living with them after seemingly spending some time in a psychiatric hospital. There is something wrong with the sky. A new planet named Melancholia is threatening to collide with the Earth and Claire cannot deal with something out of her control destroying the little world she created for herself.
The two parts of the movie are working together here and it will require patience out of you. I kept joking through the Justine part that it was a shame she got that drunk at her own wedding, but it becomes clear in Claire that she in the midst of a profound depression and that what happens to her sister as Melancholia is threatening to collide with Earth is a metaphor of what's been going on inside of her. Lars Von Trier admitted himself that Melancholia was about depression and he was able to create a powerful metaphor around it. Whatever is affecting Claire seems obvious and stupid to Justine because it has already wrecked her. The end of the world is something personal, even intimate and Lars Von Trier did a fantastic job at illustrating it in Melancholia.
Melancholia also happens to be a visual treat. If you are ready to sit through the emotionally scathing viewing that is Melancholia, you're also in for fantastic visuals. It's Lars Von Trier's most beautiful movie, it's even more haunting than his minimalistic corker Dogville. Von Trier giddily reminds you how unique and powerful his vision can be in the first ten minutes of the movie that consists in a montage of time going out of joint and weather getting nuts as Earth and Melancholia stand next to one another, to Wagner music. The visually stunning shots aren't always related to the science-fiction aspects of Melancholia though, Lars Von Trier can grasp the beauty of any moment. Outdoor shots at night are particularly gorgeous. You can almost breathe in the summer night air.
Those who will show patience and observation skills necessary to deal with a Lars Von Triermovie will be more than satisfied with Melancholia.. They will be transported to a secluded world where reality doesn't work on the same clock as ours. I found very little to dislike about this movie, except maybe the camera work that's always a little wobbly. I'm aware it's something Von Trier likes to do, but it makes me a little seasick watching his films. But Melancholia is ultimately so engrossing, it even transcends any possible technical issues and wraps you in its own personal vision of apocalypse. A movie so sincere and awe-inspiring is not something you will see every day, not even every couple of years.
Visually, Melancholia is Lars Von Trier's best by far and narratively, it ranks up there, right after Dogville. Thank God we still have directors who still try to make beautiful things happen on screen.
