Festen (The Celebration)
It seems Shii was a little bit too early with this comment. On the day he posted it, I think we already watched Festen. However, I didn’t really found the time to blog about it. I’ve become lazy, I know.
For some reason, I prefer the german DVD cover over that picture you can see (for example) on the Wikipedia article of the movie. First of all, I don’t quite understand why that maid is on the cover (and not Michael or Helene, for example) because I think her role is pretty small after all. Also, the german cover gives away a feeling of “high class family” with everybody on the cover while this picture looks like some, hm, relationship-quartet.
I think it will be rather difficult for me not to compare the two first Dogme movies – but in fact, I think that Idioterne is completely different from Festen. If I didn’t know how closely they are related to each other, I would never have guessed. Idioterne really looks like a documentation while Festen reminded me a lot of Gosford Park – high class society and loads of scandals behind.
Compared to Gosford Park, Festen is much less epic and classy, but a lot funnier and shocking. Everytime Christian stood up, we had to laugh out really loud. The movie turned out to be nothing like we’ve expected, but what we got was gorgeous.
In the end, there wasn’t as much “meaning” behind the movie as in Idioterne and the story wasn’t all that original (if you look at Gosford Park, it seems all high class society families are – in some ways – related to sexual scandals), but the execution and the way the story was build up was much more than just suspenseful. The character portraits are truly insightful and the Dogme elements were perfect in order to put emphasis on the story itself. (By the way, I wasn’t annoyed by the bucking camera this time – maybe I’ve really gotten used to it?)
A propos Dogme, we noticed one slow-motion scene – this is a violation of the rules, right?
Now my expectations for the other Dogme movies have risen even more. I wonder if this is a bad thing… If you remember, I still want to watch “Italian for Beginners”, “Mifune” and “The King is Alive”.
Ah, a movie I know, for a change. XD I saw this one twice already, never from the very beginning to end, though.
Mifune is fairly lighthearted compared to Idioterne and Festen, quite enjoyable. I would also have a look at Julien Donkey-Boy for its sheer strangeness (and the intriguing, somewhat creepy fact that Werner Herzog stars in it), if its available.