This movie is so pretentious I can't even watch it. I've tried over and over, based on the IMDb rating, but I can't get into it. Partly it's the feel of he socialist plays of the 30s and 40s. Partly it's the stilted, theaterish dialogue. I can't do it.
"I've seen things that would make you want to write a book on how to puke."
Oh man, you think this is pretentious.... you should see some other Euro-Art films.
This is like 'Ishtar' by comparison.
Limit of the Willing Suspension of Disbelief: directly proportional to its awesomeness.
Stick to Hasbro adaptations and Christopher Nolan fare
shareI have to absolutely disagree. It's extremely honest in fact.
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You see things; and you say Why? But I dream things that never were and I say Why not?
I agree with the OP. The pretentiousness is manifest in von Trier's decision to stage against a sound set. The visual tools of film are greater than those of theatre, so why not use them?
shareHe was trying something different, which I applaud. Rather than making a film like EVERY other film, he staged it against a sound set and created something unique. I like how he tries new things in his films, I get bored of the same old.
shareThe logic behind it came from the exchange between Nocole Kidman and Paul Bettany about the town in his new book:
"Why don't you just call it Dogville?"
"Wouldn't work. It needs to be universal,"
Albeit, living on a soundstage isn't universal, but I thought it gave the film an odd ability to allow the viewer to project his/her memories onto the blank backdrops. Despite the fact that this film takes place in America, I feel that not using American landscapes perhaps made the film more aesthetically accessible (after the initial shock of the sound stage).
It also has a funny sort of feeling that the physical walls we build up around ourselves are merely superficial, and it's the intangible walls that are all the more restricting (and that no one truly has privacy; they all see right through each other, but refuse to turn those analytical gazes inward).
People only use the word pretentious when they feel stupid.
The fact is, this movie proposes that corruption is circumstantial, and absolute forgiveness is arrogant.
If at any time the audience was made to feel inferior for not knowing or believing this, then it would be pretentious, but just because YOU made YOURSELF feel inferior for not enjoying what so many others believe to be excellent thought provoking storytelling...
does not make it pretentious.
Go read a book, and spare us your future inferiority anxieties. (<That was pretentiousness)
Is anyone on these board able to disagree without also insulting? IMHO, the minute you stop throwing facts and opinions start throwing stones, you lose.
shareIt’s plain that you’re describing flaws with yourself, not the film.
Your film gods: Lee Van Cleef and Laura Gemser
http://tinyurl.com/pa4ud44