Melancholia

//Directed by Lars Von Trier (2011).//



Very few would say Melancholia is an easy film to watch. In fact, after browsing through Lars Von Trier’s filmography on Wikipedia, I am pretty sure that no one has ever watched a Von Trier movie in search of light relief. The use of a hand-held camera in Melancholia, though not necessarily unpleasant, reminds the audience of Melancholia’s unflinching portrayal of clinical depression and dysfunctional relationships. Melancholia tells it like it is. It isn’t sugarcoated in any way, or polished with the conventional, tripod-mounted camerawork you would expect in such a film.
 * Cinematography: The use of a hand-held camera**

Being a film focused on depression, it is no surprise that Melancholia utilizes a lot of cold lighting. For example, the scenes in Part Two where Justine mopes about her sister’s house crying over meatloaf are lit with cold, blue undertones. Eventually, as the impending collision with Melancholia becomes apparent to Claire, she is lit with cold lighting as well. In the final scene where Justine, Claire, and Leo are sitting in the “magic cave” awaiting the collision, close-ups of Justine appear to be heavily saturated in blue, and as Melancholia approaches in the background, the entire scene is drenched in the same blue light. By contrast, the opening scene with Justine and Michael in the limousine uses much warmer lighting. This might be the only happy scene in the entire film, plagued only by the limousine driver’s incompetence to maneuver large vehicles in narrow pathways. Accordingly, the lighting changes to a cold blue tinge once Justine and Michael get out of the car and are berated by a frustrated Claire for being two hours late. It is important to note that during the banquet, the room is lit with a warm yellow glow, but Justine’s mother and Claire are both dressed in blue. This could hint at a history of clinical depression in the women of Justine’s family.
 * Lighting: The use of cold lighting and the color blue**

In the first act of the film, “Justine”, Von Trier emphasizes the impact of Justine’s depression on both her personal and professional life (“ You're now short of a boss and a husband,” as Tim puts it, in the most shameless and inappropriately timed pickup line of all time). Her blatant honesty with her boss ends in a confrontation with her resignation and him smashing a plate and driving away into the night. More poignantly, Justine’s coldness and lack of appreciation toward Michael proves to be too much for him to take, and at the end of the night, he leaves her. “This could’ve been a lot different,” Michael says, close to tears. “Yes, Michael,” Justine rolls her eyes. “It could’ve been.”
 * Editing: The division of //Melancholia// into two distinct acts**

In the second act of the film, the usually calm and emotionally stable Claire starts to exhibit increasingly volatile behavior after the threat of Melancholia’s collision approaches. In “Claire”, it is as though the two sisters have reversed their roles, with Justine now being forced to take on the role of the more levelheaded of the two, and Claire being the weepy one driving a golf cart in the middle of a pre-apocalyptic hailstorm. It is significant that Justine appears to be at her most stable during the events preceding the collision of the Earth and Melancholia, the one time in the film it would have been expected of her to freak out and lose it, which is exactly what Claire does.

By editing the film so that it is divided into two acts, Justine’s depression in act one is juxtaposed with Melancholia’s impending collision with the Earth in act two. More importantly, it demonstrates the power of the destruction of an entire planet and the destructive effects of something seemingly trivial in comparison, like depression. //Melancholia// could mean sadness. It could be the name of a planet about to collide with the Earth. Or it could be the realization that you’ve just hosted the most uncomfortable wedding reception in cinematic history.