Top 100 Most Anticipated Films of 2011: Lars von Trier’s Melancholia

#03. Melancholia

Director/Writer: Lars von Trier
Producers: Meta Louise Foldager and Louise Vesth
Distributor: Rights Available.

The Gist: Melancholia follows a group of people who react after discovering that the earth is on a collision course with another planet. Among the group we find the story of two sisters played by Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg and they pair respond to the coming cataclysm in different ways; one of them melancholic and the other more “normal.”...(more)

Cast: Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Kiefer Sutherland, Charlotte Rampling, John Hurt, Alexander Skarsgård, Stellan Skarsgård, Brady Corbet and Udo Kier.

List Worthy Reasons…: Moving from losing your child, to the notion of losing the world and everything in it, Von Trier is in the challenging genre-types portion of his career if you pair this sci-fi, perhaps dystopian-utopian versed film with his version of a horror film in Antichrist. Say what you want: he’s a filmmaker who makes for some rather unique discourse and insight in the human condition and from an actor-director standpoint, it’ll be interesting to see how much more punishment von Trier inflinges on thesp Gainsbourg.

Release Date/Status?: Cannes 2011. It could overshadow the much anticipated Malick film.