Lars von Trier

Lars von Trier (born Lars Trier; Copenhagen, April 30, 1956) is a Danish film director and screenwriter. He stands out above all for his strong creative personality and is considered one of the most innovative and multidisciplinary directors in today's cinema, despite the controversy of some of his works.Together with Thomas Vinterberg he established the rules of the Dogma 95 manifesto.

Biography

She was born in Copenhagen, Denmark on April 30, 1956.

Lars von Trier was one of the creators of Dogme 95, a cinematographic movement that calls for the return of more credible stories in the film industry, to the minimal use of special effects.

His first film as a film school graduate was Forbrydelsens Element. Despite achieving greater recognition with films like Europe, von Trier established himself as one of Europe's most important film directors in 1986 with Breaking the Waves.

This latest production, together with Dancing in the Dark (starring the Icelandic singer Björk, the French actress Catherine Deneuve and the Swedish Peter Stormare) and The Idiots or Dogma #2, forms the trilogy The hearts of gold. Von Trier has been preparing a new trilogy around the United States, whose first installment was Dogville in 2003, starring Australian actress Nicole Kidman. The second part, titled Manderlay, was released in 2005. The third has yet to be released, and the title will be Washington.

Lars von Trier is also a painter, and one of his paintings is on display on the top floor of Hillerod Castle in Denmark. He reflects an almost monochrome and distressing universe, like in his movies.

Childhood and interest in cinema

Lars Von Trier grew up in a movie-going environment. He got his first camera at the age of 11, a Super 8 with which he filmed his friends in home productions, and entered the Copenhagen film school in the 1980s. In 1981 and 1982 he won several awards at the Film Festival. Munich Cinema for his student films.

In 1983, after graduating, he premiered his debut feature: The Element of Crime (1984), with which he managed to attract attention at the Cannes Film Festival, where he received the awards for Great Technical Achievement and the Camera d'Or for First Work.

Von Trier added “von” to his name when Professor Gert Fredholm surprised him and other classmates in the editing room at night and reminded them it was closing time; The students responded by scolding him until he was beside himself. To the insults, the teacher responded by saying: "you are worse than the brats of Sealand", by which he meant the children of the burghers of Copenhagen. And right after he prompted them to put a & # 34;von & # 34; in front of their last names, so that everyone would recognize them. His classmates ignored him, but for Lars, having something in common with directors Erich von Stroheim and Josef von Sternberg appealed to him, and he decided to change his name.

Lars von Trier continued his Europe Trilogy in 1987, with the film Epidemic, about a film director –played by himself- who tries to raise money to make a film about a virus that was decimating Germany.

After Medea, made for Danish television in 1988, von Trier ended his European trilogy with Europa in 1991, a black comedy set in the post-World War II World War in Germany. Europa managed to grab the attention of its viewers with its use of overlays, rear projection and dramatic switching between black and white and color scenes. Retitled Zentropa for the US version (not to be confused with the film Europa Europa) Europa brought von Trier cinematic recognition. Disappointed by his third place at the Cannes Film Festival, he accepted the award with thanks to the "dwarf" jury president Roman Polański.

Lars von Trier continued to experiment with his film vision through a film project called Dimension, which will consist of three-minute segments over thirty years. The results of this film are yet to be seen.

Rebelled against his past upon learning, through his biological father, of his mother's death and that his father did not care for von Trier, as well as converting to Catholicism, he ended the perfectionism of his European trilogy. Because of his honesty, he admired the iconoclastic work of Carl Theodor Dreyer, with his self-imposed artistic chastity. This is how he became the co-author of Dogma 95, along with Dane Thomas Vinterberg, with whom he launched a collective call for the return of more credible stories in the film industry without the use of effects. special and mainly focused on minimal technical use.

For this reason, his films are shot with a shoulder-mounted camera, only rarely with a fixed camera. One of the fundamental characteristics of this type of film is that natural lighting is used and the type of editing is unforeseen with some scenes and shots, cut in the middle of the characters' dialogue, that do not fit with the times, which gives them a documentary or informal aspect, to create greater realism (especially at critical moments), an aspect that critics can consider a method of abbreviation.

In June 1989 Lars von Trier described himself in an interview as "a melancholic Dane masturbating in the dark to images of the film industry". Despite the fact that he sought a wider audience with English-speaking films, he achieved, thanks to his success, the resurrection of Scandinavian cinema.

In 1992 Trier founded his own studio, Zentropa (named after a fictional railway company in his film Europa).

I work in Danish television

Lars von Trier has also directed series for Danish television: The Kingdom (Riget) and The Kingdom II, a couple of miniseries, filmed on 16mm, about a haunted hospital. Ernst-Hugo Jaregard's death in 1998 prevented von Trier from making the third version of The Kingdom. Perhaps a relaunch carried out by the writer Stephen King, based on the von Trier series, titled Stephen King's Kingdom Hospital, will reach the screens through the North American network ABC.

Critical recognition for his dramatic point of view

For his film Breaking the Waves, about the sacrifice of a woman and her sexual martyrdom, he stood out with the intervention of the cinematographer Robby Müller and the emergence of the new actress Emily Watson, who played a An intense role with a simple character, von Trier received the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. The film was segmented into colored chapters, made by the painter Pers Kirkeby. Emily Watson received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress.

After the success achieved by Celebration, from Vinterberg, von Trier presented his own work of Dogma in 1998 with the film The Idiots, a film shot on digital video by the who managed to attract attention by refusing to cut a nude sequence for an orgy scene and limiting himself only to covering the genitals with black bars. In 1999 von Trier was offended when the producers artificially enhanced colors for the video release, something that went against the Dogme 95 movement.

In 1999, after executive producing a soap opera for Danish television called Morten Korch, he embarked on making a musical drama; Thus, in 2000, he made Dancer in the Dark, for which he received the Palme d'Or at Cannes for Best Film and Best Actress for the Icelandic singer Björk, who played Selma, a Czech immigrant who is losing sight.

With Dancer in the Dark (Dancing in the Dark) von Trier was again able to surprise the audience with the use of one hundred digital still cameras, used for the scenes of the Björk's song I've Seen It All, which take place on a moving train. On the other hand, the song was nominated for an Oscar for best song in 2001.

With Dancer in the Dark, von Trier began his fixation on the United States, launching his new project: a trilogy on American society. The first of the films that would make up this trilogy was Dogville (2003), which was shot entirely inside a closed hangar, with a minimal set, and with marks on the floor to indicate walls and other props elements. In it, the Australian actress Nicole Kidman embodies the role of Grace, a woman who is escaping from a mysterious past.

In Manderlay, the second part of the trilogy, von Trier takes Grace, this time played by actress Bryce Dallas Howard, to a plantation run by slaves, and once again emphasizes the life of a group of characters who continually suffer and are humiliated by an individualistic society driven by selfishness, power and personal interests.

At the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, he presented Antichrist, a controversial film starring Willem Dafoe, who received harsh criticism for its scenes of sex and self-mutilation.

The last of the films in the United States: Land of Opportunity trilogy will be Washington.

As for his works from 2010, Melancholy is a psychological drama about the end of the world, starring Kirsten Dunst. The film premiered at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival with a fairly good reception, despite the controversy aroused by the Danish director's statements about his position on Nazi ideology.

Von Trier announced that, after Melancholia, he would begin production on Nymphomaniac, a film about the sexual awakening of a woman (played by Charlotte Gainsbourg, who also appeared in Melancholy).

In 2018, von Trier premiered at Cannes his film Jack's House, which follows the path of a serial killer played by Matt Dillon.

A peculiarity about von Trier is that he has aviophobia (a fear of flying), and for this reason he has never gone further than the roads allow, which has made his job difficult on the occasions when his films are based in foreign territories such as the United States, for which it has always resorted to locations in and around Denmark.

Controversies

On May 19, 2011, the Cannes Film Festival declared the filmmaker "persona non grata," resulting in his expulsion from the festival. The controversy broke out after von Trier claimed: 'I understand Hitler... I think he did some bad things, yes I can see him sitting in his bunker at the end... I understand the man, he wasn't what we would call a nice guy, but i quite understand him and sympathize a bit with him. But I'm not with World War II, and I'm not against the Jews. No, not even against Susanne Bier... That was a joke too. I appreciate them. Well, not too much, because Israel is a pain in the ass. How do I escape this sentence? [...] Ok, I'm a Nazi".

The statements were made in the morning. That same afternoon he issued a public statement in which he apologized: "If I have hurt someone with my words this morning at the press conference, I sincerely apologize [...] I am not anti-Semitic, nor am I prejudiced. racial of any kind, nor am I a Nazi". He later declared to the press that it was all a "very bad joke", and that at the press conference a French journalist located in Cannes, due to his "bad English", according to the filmmaker, he asked him a question that he perhaps misunderstood, arguing that "I myself am Jewish, I have Jewish friends and we play jokes with each other."

Sexual Harassment Allegations

On October 16, 2017, Icelandic singer Bjork implicitly accused him of sexual harassment, stating in a post on his personal Facebook, that he had been the victim of sexual harassment "by a Danish director". Being Dancer in the Dark the only film she has shot, whose director is von Trier. She accused him of touching her improperly, of having tried to manipulate her from his position as director, and of having mistreated her after she rejected him. For his part, von Trier denied the accusations, although he admitted that there were incidents between the two on set. .

Filmography

• Ochidégartneren (The Orchid Gardener(direction, script, edition, cinematography, performance on Victor Morse's role) (1977)
• Menthe – the bienheureuse (direction, script, edition, cinematography, performance on the driver's role) (1979)
• Nocturne (direction and script) (1980-1981)
• Den Sidste Detail (The Last Detail(direction) (1981)
• Befrielsesbilleder (Image of relief(direction and script) (1982)
• Forbrydelsens Element (The element of crime(direction, script, performance like Schmuck of Ages, chamber operator of the second unit) (1984, first part of the trilogy Europe)
• Epidemic (direction, script, edition, performance as Lars/Dr. Mesmer) (1987, second part of the trilogy Europe)
• Medea (direction and script) (1988) (TV)
• Europe (direction, script, film script, performance as a Jew) (1991, third part of the trilogy Europe)
• Riget (The Kingdom(direction, script, acting as himself) (1994) (TV)
• Breaking the waves (direction and script) (1996, first part of the trilogy Golden Heart)
• Riget II (The Kingdom II(direction, script, acting as himself) (1997) (TV)
• Idioterne (The Idiots(direction, script, cinematography, performance: voice of interviewer) (1998, second part of the trilogy Golden Heart)
• D-dag (direction) (2000) (television)
• D-dag - Lise (direction) (2000) (television)
• Dancing in the dark (direction, script, camera operator, songwriting: Cvalda, In The Musicalswith Björk, Mark Bell, Sjón; I’ve Seen It All, Scatterheart, 107 Steps and New World, with Björk and Sjón) (2000, third part of the trilogy Golden Heart)
• D-dag – Den færdige film (D-dag – Cut Editors(direction) (2001) (television)
• Dogville (direction, script, camera operator) (2003) (first part of the trilogy U.S.A.)
• De Fem Benspænd ('The Five Conditions', with segments of the film The Perfect Human: Avedøre, Denmark(direction, script, performance, such as the Obstructor) (2003)
• Manderlay (direction, script) (2005) (second part of the trilogy U.S.A.)
• The boss of all this (Direktøren for det hele) (2007)
• Antichrist (2009) (first part of the Trilogy of Depression)
• Melancholy (2011) (second part of the Trilogy of Depression)
• Nymphomaniac (2013) (third part of the Trilogy of Depression)
• The House That Jack Built (2018) (direction, script)
• Washington (not produced so far, third part of the trilogy U.S.A.)
• The Kingdom Exodus (The Kingdom III(direction, script, acting as himself) (2022) (TV)

Filmography as a collaborator

• Hemmelig Sommer (acting as Lars Trier) (1969)
• Kaptajn Klyde og hans venner vender tilbage (acting as Lars Trier) (1980)
• In Verden til forskel (A World of Difference(acting as a taxi driver) (1989)
• Lærerværelset (guion) (1994) (TV)
• I Am Curious (like himself) (1995)
• Tranceformer - A Portrait of Lars von Trier (1997)
• Kvinnan i det låsta rummet (thanks) (1998) (TV)
• Hela härligheten (Love Fools(acknowledgement) (1998)
• Constance (executive producer) (without credit) (1998). Danish version: Constance - uddrag fra en ung piges dagbog (Erotic version)
• Ydmygede (The Humiliated(like himself) (1998)
• Lars from 1-10 (like himself) (1998)
• Pink Prison (executive producer) (without credit) (1999)
• I Lars von Triers (like himself) (1999) (television)
• Store Klaus og lille Lars (like himself) (1999) (TV)
• Morten Korch - Solskin kan man altid finde (like himself) (1999)
• Kopisten (The Copier(like himself) (1999)
• Foot on the Moon (like himself) (1999)
• D-dag - Instruktørene (appears to be headed) (2000) (television)
• D-dag - Boris (adminant) (2000) (television)
• D-dag - Carl (adminant) (2000) (television)
• D-dag - Niels-Henning (adminant) (2000) (television)
• Von Trier's 100 øjne (Von Trier's 100 Eyes(like himself) (2000)
• The Name of this Film Is Dogme 95 (like himself) (2000)
• 100 Cameras: Capturing Lars Von Trier's Vision (like himself) (2000)
• HotMen CoolBoyz [Executive producer] (without credit) (2000)
• From Udstillede (The Exhibited(guion, appearance as himself) (2000)
• Digtere, divaer og dogmebrødre (like himself) (2001) (TV. Episode 1.8 “2000”
• The 2001 IFP/West Independent Spirit Awards (like himself) (2001) (television)
• De Lutrede (The Purified(like himself) (2002)
• Wilbur wants to kill himself. (guide consultant) (2002)
• Trier, Kidman og Cannes (like himself) (2003) (television)
• Dogville Confessions (grade, appearance as himself) (2003)
• A Boy Named Joshua (appears as himself) (2004)
• Dear Wendy. (guion) (2004)
• Kingdom Hospital (guion of characters) (2004) (TV)
• All About Anna (executive producer) (without credit) (2005)

TV Guest Appearances

• Mens vi venter på kometen [paper of himself. Episode #1.5] (2001)

Awards and distinctions

Cannes International Film Festival