Review of Dancer in the Dark (2000) by Mason W — 20 Jul 2008

Dancer in the Dark is a tragedy. This knowledge has been with me for years. I have known little about the movie, except that it is supposed to be incredibly, incredibly sad.

It is.

The movie is about Selma (Bjork), an Czech immigrant living in America in the early 1960s. Selma is going blind, and early in the film must cheat on an eye exam to be allowed to continue working at the factory where she is employed. If she loses this job, she will not be able to save enough money to pay for the eye surgery which will prevent her son from inheriting the same disease that she has. She has long ago accepted that she must live without her sight, but has put all of her effort into making a better life for her son. You think that's sad? That's just the tip of the iceberg.

Roger Ebert (whose review of this film is terrible, by the way) says that the movie plays out like a soap opera. The events that take place are implausible, he says, and the melodrama feels as though it comes from an overly simplistic view of the world circa 1912. Ebert calls the main characters retarded, and says that the plot might be regarded by some as a mistake.

It's true that there are times when some of the things that happen seem unbelievable -- in particular, a scene of desperation involving Selma's neighbor Bill (Morse). But the film is about a woman who has grown up on musicals, who hears music in everything and daydreams about the entire world breaking spontaneously into song and dance. Those times when the movie becomes somewhat outlandish can be seen as Selma's romantic take on the world. The musical numbers are set off by different lighting, camera style, etc. But I don't believe that the songs are strictly her imagination, while the darker scenes are unquestionably real life. Everything is filtered through Selma, in a way.

Selma is a child. She looks like she is in her late twenties and she has a son who is reaching his teenage years, which means that she herself was little more than a child when she gave birth to her son. She was forced to grow up when she was not ready, relying on movie stars such as Oldrich Novy to lend her support. She is not retarded, but rather innocent. She is a romantic, yes, and so is Jeff, but they are not stupid: they are people who believe in what movies have told them and live their lives accordingly. They may seem naive, but they are no worse than the characters in horror movies who take a shower after finding that there is a serial killer hiding in the woods.

What really makes the movie work is the strength of the actors, particularly the scenes where Selma interacts with Jeff (Stormare) and Brenda (Siobhan Fallon). The way that these characters genuinely care about each other is heartbreaking. The looks on their faces -- yes, good acting is about showing me without words how you feel -- convey so so much with just a furrowed brow or lips held tightly together. It's just spectacular.

I've heard that director Lars von Trier and star Bjork did not get along. That's amazing: despite their animosity, the two of them managed to craft a remarkably emotional and beautiful film.