Those who were born in the 20th century have to come to terms with the fact that the films that once shaped their youthful experience and caused a profound emotional upheaval have now taken their place in history. Of course, there are also films that have disappeared permanently, as is often the case with audiovisual products of the same day. Those films from the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, which will be shown on cinema screens in Riga from this weekend, are survivors – vivid facts of auteur cinema. The biggest heavyweight in the current repertoire is the Danish director, the holy monster Lars von Trier, with a retrospective of his films in the cinema Splendid Palace (from April 13). It includes almost all his movies. The collection has been prepared by a Lithuanian company Onewhich is considered the most consistent and passionate European art house and distributor of festival films in Latvia. This company develops the brand Bear, lion and branchwhich attractively combines the attributes of the three most important European film festival awards – the Berlin Bear, the Venice Lion and the Cannes Palm Branch.
Cannes Festival For a golden palm branch and the festival itself also plays an important role in the life and career of Lars von Trier. The magical appeal of Cannes and its ability to define trends in cinematography and to bring fame to the creators of these trends on Olympus is of special importance. A lot has been written about it, and this fact cannot be ignored either in the context of the work of the Danish Lars von Trier or the American director David Lynch.
The glow of quotes
Almost at the same time, two directors have met on the cinema screens in Riga, whose films define the auteur cinema of the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries. Saturday, April 15, at 18 in the cinema Forum Cinemas restored David Lynch films will be shown Mulholland Road version. The film won laurels at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival, winning David Lynch the award for best director, and has become one of his most significant works. If you remember, it’s a story whose message throws enigmatic loops, it’s an enigma film in which a young, naive Hollywood conqueror, a novice actress Betty (the role that launched the career of Naomi Watts), and a refined beauty with lost memory and who calls herself for Rita (played by Laura Herring). A little later, these actresses play two other characters, allowing everyone to interpret the plot of the film according to their own understanding.
Ar Mulholland Road have managed to meet from time to time to conclude that the power of the film and the power of David Lynch’s direction have not lost anything since 2001 – the time when he made this drama about the glitz, misery and, in a sense, history of Hollywood. On the way to Mulholland quotes and references to cinema’s past shine beautifully – dark movie, for movies Gilda (1946) and Sunset Blvd (1950). The restored Mulholland Road will be a special experience for both those who have seen the film and those who have not.
A parade of harshness
In the cinema Splendid Palace from today, April 13, it is possible to see almost all of Lars von Trier’s films, starting with his early works Element of crime (1984) and Europe (1991). In them, Lars von Trier plays with elements of harsh genres rooted in American film culture. The interplay and dynamics of Europe and America is a fundamental theme in Trier’s films, which started innocently – with attempts to use and stylize elements of American cinema, but later grew into a critical attitude towards American dominance – both in politics and in the entertainment industry. Crime Element is the story of a detective who uses questionable methods to investigate serial murders. Europe, on the other hand, brings hypnotic force into the reality of post-war Germany, the space of intrigue and crime, which allows the director to play with the tense black and white dark movie stylistics. Lars von Trier’s early films are visually original and striking, and they quickly gained the attention of the young Danish director at the Cannes Film Festival, where both Crime Element and Europa won awards. These films laid a solid foundation for the monument that Lars von Trier created for himself and for Danish cinema over the next two decades. In the 90s, he was an idol – a genius of auteur cinema, whose films were meticulously analyzed, whose creative, daring experiments he respected.
In 1996, Lars von Trier hosted Splitting the waves – a harsh melodrama, in which he introduced the essential theme of sacrifice and victimization in several of his subsequent films. Splitting the waves the main character, Bess, played by the British actress Emily Watson, is a victim of the director. Fulfilling the wishes of her husband, who was paralyzed in an accident, Bess surrenders to the lust of strange and brutal men, which destroys and destroys her. The film’s unusual visual solution, including the use of a hand-held camera typical of the director’s later films, and the dramatic acting created a special experience. The film highlights the trends that triumphed in the manifesto Dogme95.
Breaking dogmas
Dogme95 was a sensation of the 90s, a concept created by several Danish directors – first of all Lars von Trier – that called for following certain laws of filmmaking in order to return to the film medium the truth lost in commercialism. Without going into the contradictory points of the manifesto, we must conclude that Dogme95 was not only an artistic concept, which also encouraged the abandonment of the name of the film director in the credits, it also attracted the attention of Danish cinema.
Lars von Trier himself Dogme95 has strictly followed the rules in only one film – Idiots (1998). In aesthetics close to documentary cinema, the film shot with a hand-held camera follows a group of people who purposefully engage in provoking their fellow citizens. Idiots have their place in the artist’s career, which was also strengthened by his involvement Dogme95 in motion. However, in his future works, the director was not even going to obey any strict rules. From Dogme95 for principles, he basically borrowed only a passion for the latest technology (at the turn of the century it was video) and work with hand-held cameras, which gave the film’s visuality roughness, the “three-dimensionality” of the frame, documentaryness. However, in the films of Lars von Trier, experimentation with style has always gone hand in hand with convincing storytelling.
was created in 2000 Dancer in the Dark, which can be considered the culmination of Lars von Trier’s work. The film won the main prize of the Cannes festival Golden palm branch and divided audiences into those who hate the film and those who bow their heads in admiration of Lars von Trier as an emotional manipulator and powerful storyteller. I belong to the second: I believe that Dancer in the Dark is the director’s best work. It stars Icelandic singer Björk as musical-loving Czechoslovakian immigrant Selma. Selma, like her son, gradually loses her sight. She works hard in a tin bowl factory to save money for her son’s vision surgery. However, Life in the USA is not a musical (elements of this genre play an important role in the film) with the obligatory happy ending. Dancer in the Dark Lars von Trier overturns all our ideas about musicals, the principles of their shooting and the visuality of traditional, classic cinema. The use of a hand-held camera, the rough texture of the image creates the unique visual style of this drama, which accentuates the tragic experience of Selma.
Lars Von Trier has since made two more films set in America – Dogville (2003) and Manderle (2005). However, Trier’s America is conditional: action in Dogville takes place in a dark pavilion where outlines of houses are drawn on the floor. At one time, Dogville shocked both with radical environmental conditioning, which is rarely allowed in cinema (its task is to imitate reality), as well as with the message and the cast. The story of Grace, a young woman’s path of humiliation in an American town in Dogville, stars Hollywood star Nicole Kidman in the lead role, with the legendary American actress Lauren Bacall appearing in one of the roles. Dog rest is the first part of an American trilogy once conceived by Lars von Trier, its sequel, dedicated to the themes of slavery and freedom, is Manderley, in which the role of Grace is played by another American actress, Bruce Howard.
Apocalypse suits him
In the XXI century, the life of Lars von Trier has not been strewn with roses. After Dancers in the dark despite the triumph, he successfully continued to work. came out in 2009 Antichrist – a radical work about loss, death, mourning, sexuality and the nature that condemns us to destruction. Antichrist shocks both with the sophisticated, operatic and tragic introductory episode in which the child dies, and with the entire subsequent development of the story. Lars von Trier is very good at introduction episodes, the opening scene of the apocalypse in the film is also excellent. Melancholy (2011), which is a European doomsday story that uses and deconstructs elements of American disaster movies. Melancholy is the last Danish director’s film to be screened at Cannes. He was kicked out of this elite festival after a strange, stupid speech at a press conference. Lars von Trier mentioned Hitler, and in a positive context, thereby creating a huge scandal and largely ending his career. In the last ten years, the artist has taken up dilogy Nymphomaniac (2013) and the movie The House That Jack Built (2018), which is a risqué play on the theme of violence. That’s what he is – a classic of auteur cinema in all its glory. Even if you don’t like any of his films, Lars von Trier is neither warm nor cold – his place in history has long been reserved for him.
The retrospective of Lars von Trier will continue until April 30, the list of screenings can be found Splendid Palace Homepage. The film screenings will be accompanied by introductions by various lecturers.
