[rating;3.5]

Director: Lars Von Triers

Production: Zentropa Entertainment, Memphis Film.

Cast: Kristen Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Alexander Skarsgård, Kiefer Sutherland, John Hurt, Stellan Skarsgård, Charlotte Rampling

136 min

Rating: R

Genre: Drama/ Sci-fi

Melancholia... by exact meaning, it is ‘the state of extreme depression characterized by tearful sadness and irrational fears’. This is also the name of new movie directed by Lars Von Trier’s latest offering this year.

Melancholia has a powerful cast including Kristin Dunst, Kiefer Sutherland, Alexander Skarsgård, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Stellan Skarsgård. This is a heavy film, that has generated multiple kinds of reaction, while TimeOut London called it ” lethargic”, The Telegraph called it ‘mesmerizing’!!

 

Melancholia revolves around the sisters Justin(Kristin Dunst) and Claire(Charlotte Gainsbourg), whose contradicting reaction to the ‘end of the world’ phenomenon is the soul of the movie. A general complain about the film is that it is extremely slow, on the other hand it is a visual beauty, operatic in dimension with a series of impressive and breathtaking images.

The movie has already made rounds of the festivals and is scheduled for a November release. I doubt Melancholia to be a super hit, inspite of True Blood crush Alexander Skarsgård. However, Kristin Dunst is beautiful in this movie, and has done a extremely good job and won the Best Actress award at Cannes this year.

 

Melancholia deals with a difficult subject. Lars Von Trier is a director who either you love or you do not. Something that sets this movie apart is the grandeur that  arthouse cinema generally avoids. Melancholia is explosive, is spellbinding in terms of pure visual expirience.

The film sets off from the wedding of Justin, who stands alone in this family extravanganza. She suffers from melancholia, from depression. That is the first half. In the second half, this depression becomes a planet Melancholia, a speck in the night in the first half of the film, and a threatning, destructive entity that threatens to destroy earth, its happiness, beauty.

That is how depression is seen, a minute speck that one does not notice and then all all

consuming, threatning force that one cannot avoid, engulfing all and everything.

Either you will see the beauty of this creation, bright, awe-inspiring while talking of destruction, or you will find the depression take over you, presenting to you a world you neither want to see nor believe in.

If you guys like a good movie, with good acting and a definite visual extravaganza, this is the film to go for. However, this might turn you off if you want to have a fun-time.