This is a 2000 musical drama directed by Lars von Trier and starring singer Björk as Selma and Catherine Deneuve as "Cvalda". It is set in the 60's and talks about a woman with a hereditary eye disease which will make her go blind. Her 10-year-old son also has the disease and will suffer the same fate of going blind unless he can get an operation to save his sight. Selma and her son moved to the United States from Czechoslovakia where this operation is possible.
In order to get the money together for her son's eye operation, Selma works, rather clumsily, at a factory. There, she daydreams about musical scenes that begin with sounds of the factory machines. She does this in other places, as well. After Selma breaks a machine, she is let go from the job.
Selma's landlords, Bill and Linda, have financial difficulties. Bill decides to steal the money Selma had been saving up. Selma discovers this and goes to get the money back. In an extremely gut-wrenching scene, Bill asks Selma to take his life. This is the only way for her to get her money back. It can be very uneasy to watch Selma kill Bill.
I do not want to give everything away, but I can say that unfortunately, this movie does not have a happy ending, apart from some hope about Selma's son's sight.
This is one of the most captivating movies I have ever watched. It has a definite depressing quality, but you cannot help but feel for Selma. The musical sequences are absolutely fantastic. Björk herself wrote the music of the soundtrack, but not the lyrics.
Love it or hate it, this movie will be extremely hard to forget.
Mattias
No comments:
Post a Comment