Melancholia

[Deleted]

I will admit to a teensy disappointment that the stunning tableaux in the first ten minutes didn't make another appearance, that the slo-mo, Peter Greenaway-style, gorgeous images were just postcards from various points in the film. God, Claire carrying her son across the sinking lawn!

[unimpressed]

Oct 24, 2011 19:45:52 GMT -4 @bstewart said:

I will admit to a teensy disappointment that the stunning tableaux in the first ten minutes didn't make another appearance, that the slo-mo, Peter Greenaway-style, gorgeous images were just postcards from various points in the film. God, Claire carrying her son across the sinking lawn!

I wondered if (spoiler) the tableaux were Justine's premonitions? They were dreamy slightly skewed snapshots of later scenes. I wondered about their purpose in the beginning until she mentions the dark woolly tangles in her dreams. Then after the beans in the jar reveal I thought perhaps she "knew" all along these visions would come to pass and that fed her depression

[Deleted]

Hmmm. Good call. I'm def gonna hafta watch it again but need a little time to process Round One. I found the most haunting, soul-corroding aspect of Justine's *knowing* was her thoughts on humanity's place in the universe. Gulp.

[save lilo!]

I watched this tonight and I loved it. The pacing was so slow but I was still literally at the edge of my seating thinking, "I want to know what's going to happen!!!"

I loved that scene where Justine locked herself in the library room and changed all the books that were displayed to figurative art plates -- that seemed to correspond to various images in the movie. Do I have to spoiler this?

[gitsie007]

I wondered about that scene too, save lilo!. Thanks for explaining it since it makes sense to me now.

Spoiler comment below

I have heard some people comment that they thought the whole wedding was fake. The 'wedding' was cooked up to hopefully bring Justine out of her depression. Some clues: The tense comments between the older sister Claire and her husband saying he spent a lot of money on this wedding, as if Claire thought up the whole thing and persuaded her husband to help pay for the guests and such. The indifferent behavior of her mother, the wedding guests seemed pretty unenthusiastic. Then, there was the scene where Justine was supposed to have sex with her new husband and he said something like 'Well, it did not work, did it?'
Then, there was her boss, who happened to be her new hubby's father, who was pushing her for an advertising idea and promoting Justine to a new position at her work. During the course of the wedding reception, Justine seemed less and less into it but in the beginning wanted to do this but then realized it was not working.
In the second scene, there was no mention of Justine's 'husband' or boss.

I don't know what to think about this theory but it is interesting and made me think. I think it was just that Justine wanted to get married for real and once it happened, she was not into it and her depression was getting worse. It was not working so she just gave up.