Re: 705 Breaking the Waves
Posted: Sun Nov 18, 2018 5:57 am
Has any Christian theologian ever analyzed this movie? Because I'd be interested in that.
I have been wondering if in a strange way the film that works as the best companion piece to Bess in Breaking The Waves is how the relationship between Jørgen Leth and Lars von Trier plays out in The Five Obstructions. Throughout that film von Trier is the kind of devillishly malevolent taskmaster setting up fiendishly difficult rules for how he wants Leth to remake his short film The Perfect Human multiple times and then when Leth manages to overcome the situation and proudly brings back his new production as almost a kind of 'offering' to von Trier, he is often met with a dismissive shrug and a new task set! Despite being a documentary (or perhaps more accurately a 'reality TV' structured piece) Jørgen Leth is very much in the Bess role of both being upset at the unreasonable demands being made of him and yet also tacitly accepting von Trier's role as the figure of authority that he has to be deferent towards, and almost humiliate himself for, throughout the film (the aloof God figure, if you will), which leads to the surprisingly affecting and complicated ending:Peter-H wrote: Thu Nov 15, 2018 7:40 pmPerhaps Bess's sacrifice doesn't necessarily have any causal connection to her going to heaven; maybe the movie is saying that her sacrifice in and of itself was pointless and misguided but the fact that she was willing to do that shows that she's faithful and loving which is why she goes to heaven. In other words maybe she was rewarded for who she was not what she did.
Spoiler for the ending of The Five Obstructions
In which von Trier says that, because everything that Leth has made is unsatisfying, that he is going to take the footage from all of the films that Leth has made and make a film of it himself and wants Leth to read a voiceover script that he will write but will only be credited to Leth. This takes the form of a searing comment on von Trier's unreasonable God-like position throughout the rest of the film by the director who was 'forced' into remaking his original film and (albeit willingly) mangling it to fit into various contexts and locations that were not originally intended:
"Maybe you put words in other people's mouths to get out of saying them yourself...You say I didn't dare to find my way into what I so dishonestly and skillfully conceal and you imagine to be so valuable. The dishonest person was you, Lars. You only saw what you wanted to see...You wanted to make me human, but that is what I am. You got me to play along but you let me get on the defensive. As we all know, it is the attacker who really exposes himself. The truth is you got it wrong. and you fell flat on your face! How does the perfect human fall?"
"Maybe you put words in other people's mouths to get out of saying them yourself...You say I didn't dare to find my way into what I so dishonestly and skillfully conceal and you imagine to be so valuable. The dishonest person was you, Lars. You only saw what you wanted to see...You wanted to make me human, but that is what I am. You got me to play along but you let me get on the defensive. As we all know, it is the attacker who really exposes himself. The truth is you got it wrong. and you fell flat on your face! How does the perfect human fall?"