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Dancer in the Dark by Daniel Papkin Even my most casual acquaintances know how difficult it is to get me out of the house, but when no less an authority than People magazine says of a film, as they have of this latest effort from Dogma dandy, Lars Von Trier, that "it, friends, is art," I slip on my toe shoes and skip nimbly to the nearest multiplex to sop up the high culture. Sadly, Dancer in the Dark is more arty than artful. More painfully self-aware than a debating candidate, this anti-musical holds everything but its own cleverness in contempt. Indeed, were it not for the occasional Bjork video slipped in amidst the drudgery, this item would have nothing at all to recommend it. The action is set in Washington state in 1964 and centers on Selma (Bjork), a musical-obsessed Czech factory worker with failing eyesight. Though her impending blindness makes work difficult, she is pulled through by her loyal friend, Kathy (Catherine Deneuve, stately as ever), and she stows away her money for an operation on her son, Gene, who shares her optical affliction. PAGE 1 | 2 |
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When this stash is nabbed by her cop-pushed-to-the-edge landlord (David Morse), and Selma attempts to get back what's hers, things go as they must in a world as miserable as the one of this film. As for the Icelandic natural wonder, she is, naturally, wonderful. She somehow gets away with not exactly acting and not exactly not acting, something the rest of the talented cast has a little more trouble with. I liked her songs, too. But they end all too quickly, and the camera recommences jerking around like it has misplaced its Ritalin prescription, which makes it very difficult to savor the atrocious dialogue. If I were the movie, this is where I would burst into song. The film's most notable conceit, in fact, involves the sudden eruption of musical numbers into the grim proceedings. They are meant, I suppose, to contrast Selma's rich fantasy world with dreary reality. Not that we are ever truly surprised by these numbers pulled out of thin air, however, for the film stock blushes like a schoolgirl whenever production numbers loom. The sight of citizens moving synchronously far from the MGM lot might seem fresh and deliciously pointed had it not already been done with greater wit in the far superior Pennies From Heaven--and, oh yeah, the Bjork video that Spike Jonze directed. Now that, friends, was art. What did you think of this movie? Sound off in the Movie Forum. PAGE 1 | 2 |