Dogville: A Second Opinion
Adrian Zak gives his view on the Danish director's controversial film.Certainly the most anticipated and hyped film of the Cannes Film Festival - and one of the most controversial, Danish director Lars Von Trier pushes all the right buttons once again to rub critics up the wrong way.
The film takes place on a largely bare stage, with the town's building marked out and labelled on the floor - and the actors, for the most part, miming opening doors etc. And this goes on for three hours...
1920s USA. A young woman arrives in the (literally) dead-end town of Dogville on the run from gangsters. The townsfolk elect to shelter her.
Though initially distrustful of the outsider, the town's population eventually welcomes her. But there are tensions and, inevitably, they turn against her.
The gangsters are offering a reward for her and the town places a call to turn her in. However, when the Mob arrives things are not what they seem and the town of Dogville is in for a shocking surprise.
It didn't sound promising - a 3hr movie on a bare stage and the actors performing what sounds like an acting workshop/am-dram production. But this was the best film of Cannes - robbed at the awards - and one of the best and most surprising films of the year.
In short, Von Trier's gimmick design works - and works wonderfully. A hard sell for sure - even the film company have prepared a shorter cut.
But it's the slow build up of tension and the changing of loyalties that make the deliciously evil ending (shades of a Shakespearean tragedy here) all the more powerful - and harrowing. This is an essential movie.
Adrian Zak
