rating:
(out of
4 stars)Denmark, Sweden, France, The Netherlands, Norway, Iceland; 1996
Directed by Lars Von Trier; produced by Peter Aalbæk Jensen, Vibeke Windeløv; written by Lars Von Trier
Starring Emily Watson, Stellan Skarsgård, Katrin Cartlidge, Jean-Marc Barr, Adrian Rawlins, Udo Kier
Below you will find a temporary review for this film. The real (better, more complete) review will be online very soon.
When performances in a movie are great the movie itself is already
watchable, even if the rest isn't very interesting. It seems to be director
Lars von Trier's gift to get great performances from his actors. The
complete cast from his 'Idioterne', Björk in 'Dancer in the Dark', Nicole
Kidman in 'Dogville' and Stellan Skarsgard and especially Emily Watson in
this movie, 'Breaking the Waves', give perfect performances. Fortunately
other things in this movie are very interesting as well. Interesting and
sad.
Bess (Emily Watson), who lives in a Scottish village somewhere in the
seventies, is a sweet girl but not completely right in the head. She marries
a man named Jan (Stellan Skarsgard), an outsider, and the community she
lives in is not very pleased. It is one of those communities that live under
the strict rules of the Lord, although you can hardly believe the Lord has
meant it this way. The movie opens at Bess and Jan's wedding, where Bess
loses her virginity, and from that moment she loves Jan with all her heart,
as well as his love for her. Also the physical love.
Jan works on an oil rig in the North Sea and he gets paralyzed from the neck
down. Since there is a good chance he can never make love to Bess again, a
thought he can't stand, he asks her to make love with other men. For his
sake, he tells her, so she can tell her experiences to him. She doesn't like
doing that but does it anyway. She believes that her love for Jan, and this
way of expressing that, can save him. What happens is inevitable in a way,
since we have learned how Bess and the people in the village are.
Emily Watson gives the perfect performance as Bess. She has many touching
moments, some of them even funny. When she sees a rabbit she impersonates it
and it is hard not to smile, even if you know what happened a couple of
minutes earlier. Since the movie is from Bess' point of view the movie
doesn't ask the question that Bess isn't asking. Why would Jan ask her to
make love to another man, while he can probably guess it is killing Bess?
Lars von Trier's direction, the hand-held camera and the performances create
the atmosphere of the movie, which is a sad one, although it has some bright
moments. This is a great and daring movie, with a great closing sequence in
the end.