..Gary Dretzka
..Noah Forrest
..Leonard Klady
..R.J. Matson
..David Poland
..Douglas Pratt
..Ray Pride
..Michael Wilmington

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I saw Dogville a few days ago and for me, it is von Trier’s first great film. Why? Because it is, again, for me, his first complete film. It is also a truly universal story, a fact which left me wondering what all the anti-American talk was when it opened at Cannes. I guess if you want to hate America, you can point to the fact that these characters are in the United States. But the story strikes me as a true Everyman saga. From the chalk on slate design of the set to the minimalist props to the cleanly defined set of 15 characters, adding Nicole Kidman’s character and eventually, a few others, the film seems to be a clear map of the boundaries of the societal human heart.

The storyline is relatively simple. It is a tiny town of 15 with a large mountain on one side and a long road into town on the other. The society of 15 has been together for a long time and has the intimacy of a small group, with dyads and triads within the group. Add Nicole Kidman’s Grace to the mixture. She is sex. She is glamour. She is vulnerability. She is mystery. She is opportunity. She is freedom. She is threat.

What happens to this – or any – community when faced with change?

Von Trier says in the notes that he never saw or read Our Town, but the resemblance is more in the design that in the storytelling… the sets without walls. And von Trier and his cinematographer, Anthony Dod Mantle, make this work better than you would imagine it could on film. Again, I am back to an earlier theme about form versus function.

The same thing is true of The 5 Obstructions. Each of the films is made on a different canvas. And yet, the themes change only slightly. The only disappointment in the film is that there is not an opportunity to see all six films from beginning to end. And in the life of this doc, it is appropriate to do it the way they have. But I would love to see every frame of every one of them, since the potential boredom would surely be overwhelmed by the larger lessons to be found in the more subtle nuances.

by David Poland

Dogville
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Director: Lars von Trier
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Country: Denmark/Sweden/United Kingdom/France/Germany
Year: 2003
Time: 177 minutes
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Cast: Nicole Kidman, Lauren Bacall, Harriet Andersson, Paul Bettany, Patricia Clarkson, James Caan,
Ben Gazzara, Chloë Sevigny,
Stellan Skarsgård
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Production Company: Zentropa Real/Almaz Film Production/Wajnbrosse Productions/Panic Productions
Executive Producer: Carsten Holst
Producer: Carsten Holst
Written By: Lars von Trier, Jørgen Leth
Cinematography: Dan Holmberg,
Kim Hattesen
Editor: Camilla Moeller
Sound: Hans Moeller