Dancer in the Dark

Reportedly the third in acclaimed director Lars von Trier's "Golden Hearts" trilogy (preceded by Breaking the Waves and The Idiots), this film is a hip reworking of the classic Hollywood Musical, starring international pop diva Bjork. Set somewhere in rural Washington state, Czech immigrant Selma ...more

Dancer in the Dark (2000) is nothing if not divisive, which probably pleased bad boy auteur Lars von Trier. Boldly merging two florid genres, the melodrama and the musical, with a handheld video, monophonic style (in the dramatic scenes) that is stridently drab, Dancer's ultra-soap opera, movie-literate plot and kaleidoscopically avant-garde musical interludes reveal the lie of musical fantasy while creating a sensory experience that is as powerful as it is manipulative. Waifish Selma is so ...more