Von Trier visits the IFC center

A week ago, to celebrate the release of Manderlay (the latest Lars von Trier controversial cinematic accomplishment), the IFC Center in New York held a complete retrospective on the Danish Filmmaker, and, most of all, a video conference with the world’s most reclusive director. It was also the first experiment of iQ&A (video Q&A through an ipod device), which will be followed in the upcoming months by long distance interviews with directors Hou Hsiao Hsien and Wim Wenders. IONCINEMA.com was there.

A lot has been said and written about the second part of Lars Von Trier’s trilogy USA: Land of Opportunities. Somebody called it a “masterpiece”, others a “sick and manipulative anti-American pamphlet”. The story is known. After leaving Dogville, Grace (a wonderful Bryce Dallas Howard reprising the role of Nicole Kidman) ends up in Alabama, where she realizes that in the Manderlay plantation black people still live under slavery. Sincerely disgusted by the situation and willing to bring democracy at any cost, Grace frees the slaves of Manderlay only to discover that, perhaps, things were better before…

I saw the film last year in Cannes, but I have to say that to watch it on American soil is a quite different experience. And when, over the end credits, we see a series of photographs portraying the darkest side of the US (from Ku Klux Klan to the beating of Rodney King, from Vietnam to Iraq) on the notes of David Bowie’s Young Americans, we might wonder if this time the self-proclaimed Communist director hasn’t gone too far. I personally marry the thesis of the masterpiece, albeit undoubtedly sick and manipulative.

There’s no doubt about one fact. S&M master Von Trier has never been so twisted and provoking. Can we really teach democracy? Or is this act a form of dictatorship? Do we really want freedom? Or is it more convenient to be a slave? But most of all: are we allowed to raise these questions? While Roger Ebert acknowledged that “the film uses language and description few American films would dare to use”, Variety’s critic Todd McCarthy, who’s never been tender to Von Trier, opened his Cannes review in these terms: “Self-appointed American history professor Lars von Trier has come up with another barbed allegorical lecture about the ugliness of the U.S. legacy.” Yet, it was while I was watching the iQ&A that followed the screening that I realized that, more than anything else, it’s a problem of perspective. Truth is, Americans and Europeans have a totally different approach to the same issues. And while the young Americans were asking questions about gender, race, and nationality, the European director was on a completely different planet, substituting sociology with philosophy and contigential with universal.

But let’s start from the beginning.

[Lars Von Trier appears onscreen from his home in Denmark. His English is pretty poor; his reluctance to meet people doesn’t help either. – Richard Peña, Program Director of the NYFF at Lincoln Center, breaks the ice with some technical questions about camera movements, editing, actors and rehearsal.]

“In my early films – explains Von Trier – I used to adopt a very classic style in terms of frame composition and camera movements. Then, I realized that hand-held cameras better suit my idea of cinema. Now, I approach a scene with only one guideline: my curiosity as a director towards what’s happening in front of me. I call it pointing instead of framing. Yet, I always like to experiment and in my next film [a Danish comedy entitled Direktøren for det hele a.k.a My Man the President ] I’m using a stationary camera in a very complex way that I can’t anticipate. You’ll see […]

As for my style of editing, it has changed a lot during the years as well. Now I adapt a looser model. Since I shoot different takes of a very same scene, this allows me to scout several options and explore more. It’s also much more fun […]

What do I look for in an actor? Complete openness. I need actors who are willing to give it a shot and are not afraid to explore. I tried rehearsals a few times, even before this new film. I hated it. To sit at a table and simply read the lines of a script it’s a very depressing experience. I prefer to go to shoot directly”.

Peña’s last question directly addresses the political issues of Manderlay, and officially opens the Q&A with the audience. Asks Peña: “Manderlay is a film about racism in America. Yet, a lot of critics thought that it’s even more about the current situation of the US Army in Iraq, and the whole idea of bringing democracy in a new Country at all costs.”

“It’s true – answers Von Trier – I think it’s very resonant nowadays. Yet, I have to say that this all idea of shaping other Countries and forcing them to adopt our ideology and our way of life it’s not just an American problem. Unfortunately, Europe started it centuries ago.”

A couple of people ask Von Trier questions about his future projects: “Did you give up the idea of shooting the final part of the trilogy?” “Did you run out of money during the shooting?” “Is it true that your next films are going to be very different?”

Von Trier: “Honestly, right now I can’t say if I will ever shoot Wasington, the final chapter of my trilogy USA: Land of Opportunities. I wrote a couple of drafts, but I don’t think its good enough. We’ll see. I have to feel it. And right now I am not ready. Also, I’m going through some personal changes. I’m 50 now. I think it’s about time to enjoy life a little more. I am afraid this is not what the audience wants from me, and I understand it. If one of my favorite directors had told me such a thing, I would have tried to persuade him not to. But I really need to try something else. I want to do something small and fast. It will be like going back to film school. Besides, the political aspect of the trilogy was important to me as a man, but less as an artist […]

As for the financial issues, we didn’t run out of money. We did have some difficulties, but that never scared me. Any obstacle for me is very positive; it makes me want to do the film even more. I see an obstacle as a gift. It’s difficult to say why a film for me is so much worth fighting for. I guess it’s like when I saw Tarkovski’s The Mirror for the first time. I wanted to see more of it. I wanted it to happen again.”

A girl, maybe touched and disturbed by the final credits of the film, provokes him: “I actually identify myself as a young American. How do you identify yourself?”

“Well, honestly I don’t think at myself as a Dane. People criticized me when I said this before, but it doesn’t mean that I don’t want to be Danish, it just means that I don’t give so much importance to where I am born. I don’t think nationalities should have such an importance in our lives. But then again, I don’t even identify myself as a white, or a male, or else. I guess I’m just a freak.” Laughs.

Q: A girl is concerned on the gender issues: “After I saw Breaking the Waves and Dancer in the Dark, I thought you liked to portray submissive women. Then I saw Dogville and Manderlay and I realized that maybe I was wrong…”

LVT: “Honestly, I don’t think about my main characters from a gender perspective. I do think women offer a good material, because men sometimes are less open and more boring, but I really don’t think about my characters in terms of gender. If you want, women just make a story more interesting and human, that’s all. Besides, I’m a huge fan of Carl Theodor Dreyer, and he used to portray amazing female characters. He might have influenced me.”

Q: One woman asks him how to break this circle of humiliation that persists in both Dogville and Manderlay.

LVT: “I really don’t have an answer. During the shooting we talk a lot about issues like, for example, internal racism. I think that if you really want to break that circle, the best way is to stop humiliating yourself. There’s a lot of self humiliation around…”

Q: One guy says that he was born in South Africa dreaming of the US as a land of freedom. Then he came here and felt as a second class citizen for his sexual orientation. He asks Von Trier if he saw Brokeback Mountain.

LVT: Von Trier laughs: “No, I haven’t, though I know the story, and I find it very funny, interesting. Honestly, I see very few American films nowadays. I saw lots of movies in my youth, then I suddenly stopped. Now I just live on my catalogue of selected old films. Maybe it’s not a good thing. I am sure there are a lot of great films around.”

Q: A NYU student who is taking a course that compares Von Trier to Godard wants to know what the director thinks about this parallelism…

LVT: “I really don’t know what to say. I’ve never seen Godard’s films, I am not familiar with his cinema. A lot of people stress on the political aspects of my films, but I have to say that I never thought that it was the main element of my films, not even of the trilogy. If Dogville and Manderlay are just perceived as political films, then maybe I have done something wrong. The political aspect is just one ingredient. But I give you this. I am a cynical person; therefore I use the political controversy to my purpose.”

We have a clear example one minute later, when, asked to move to the left in order to enter the frame of the webcam, he answers: “You know I am always happy to move to the left!”

Q: Then, a man asks Von Trier if he had problems in casting black actors:

LVT: “Of course! We had to use mainly British actors, because for African Americans it was too difficult to accept my point of view, at least from the script. I hope that when they see the finished film they change their mind.”

But interestingly enough, the only one interviewer who seemed to have related the most with Von Trier’s intention is actually an African American guy. At first he provokes Von Trier asking if he has any black friends (to which the director replies joking: “I actually do have a black friend, but I can’t stand him. He pisses me off all the time”). Then, more seriously, the person touches the right point: Q: “Everybody says that Manderlay is a film about the historical issue of African American slavery in the US, but honestly to me it looks more like a universal story about democracy and dominion, that just happens to have African Americans as main characters.”

LVT: Von Trier completely agrees: “I wanted it to be much more than a simple commentary on slavery in the US, even though it was inspired by the pictures that we see in the end credits. See, European have racial problems too, but those are quite different from yours. Yet, it’s very difficult for me to discuss these issues in a foreign language. I don’t want to risk to use a wrong word.”

In the end, the theatre manager asks Von Trier what he thought about the iQ&A experience.

“Well… I hate talking to people, but it was a very nice experience. Besides, this way it’s like if I were in New York right now. And I can assure you that this is the only way you are going to see me in your country.” Here he goes again…