Melancholia; quirky disaster movie about depression

Melancholia
Directed by Lars von Trier
In cinemas from December 22

Melancholia is a quirky disaster movie telling how the world will end with a bang and a whimper. But it is really a film that dwells on the on the essence of melancholia; pervading gloom, depression and a sense of inadequacy along with the more positive notion of reflection and self-analysis.

It looks at the way in which depression can be both a personal issue as well as a wider issue which can affect the whole planet.

In the film, two sisters go through depressive periods. Justine has a personal breakdown on her wedding day and Claire gets affected by the looming end of the world.

Director Lars von Trier has said of the film that, “I desired to dive headlong into the abyss of German Romanticism. Wagner in spades.”

Certainly there is a lot of heavy German Romanticism and Wagner, with chunks of Tristan and Isolde throughout the film. The climax has all the power of Wagner's Götterdämmerung and Valhalla.

But it’s inspired by a lot more. It’s a homage to a host of other artists including the romanticism of Visconti, the surrealism of Bunuel and the films such as Resnais' Last Year in Marienbad. There’s also the odd reference to Shakespeare, as in the dreamlike sequence of Justine lying in a stream á la Ophelia.

The opening slow motion sequence owes much to the early Bunuel/Dali film Un Chein Andalou. It is like the introduction to a 19th-century novel summarising the main characters and ideas of the tale. The main characters are presented with a set of almost abstract images which relate to psychological aspects associated with them. These are intercut with images from space, where we see a giant planet approaching Earth and eventually smashing into it.

The film is in two distinct parts, one titled Justine and the other Claire.

In the first section Justine (Kirsten Dunst) and Michael (Alexander Skarsgard) are celebrating their marriage at a sumptuous party in the home of her sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourgh) and brother-in-law John (Kiefer Sutherland). Despite Claire's best efforts, the wedding is a fiasco, with family tensions mounting and relationships fraying. Justine has a breakdown, has sex with a stranger on the lawn and Michael leaves her.

In the second section, Claire and her husband, who are now looking after the very depressed Justine, have their own problem - actually the world’s problem. The planet Melancholia is menacing the Earth and the two of them are researching the movements of the planet on the internet and through their telescope. Initially they seem to think the planet will pass them by but on the final day it smashes into the Earth.

As well as exceptional performances by Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg, there are some inspired cameo appearances by Charlotte Rampling and John Hurt.

The film manages to capture the mood of depression with Kirsten Dunst giving a great performance as Justine; slowly withdrawing from her fiance, her parents, the wedding and the world.

Von Trier has assembled characters and scenes which range from the powerfully dramatic, the brilliantly comic and intensely surreal. It’s a combination which makes for a film which hovers between the philosophical, the psychological and the fantastic. It is filled with extraordinarily beautiful images.

While it is about the end of the world, this is a film which is more contemplative than action-packed.