Kirsten Dunst gives a raw and fiercely brave performance as the newlywed Justine, who crumbles on her wedding night when symptoms hit her with irresistible force. Von Trier's camera captures her anguish with empathy and visual poetry.
As the mysterious planet Melancholia approaches Earth, the film becomes a hypnotic allegory of depression's ability to warp our perception of reality and our place in the universe.
Charlotte Gainsbourg lives up to Dunst's great work, imbuing her character with a serene strength in the face of oblivion.
The film's terrible ending is both heartbreaking and deeply moving, a fitting coda to von Trier's penetrating study of mental illness.
With Melancholia, Lars von Trier has created a wittily bleak meditation on clinical depression and existential fear.
From the very first frames of the film, saturated with a cosmic blue gloom, he plunges us into the inner world of two melancholy sisters.
With Melancholia, this great Danish auteur has created his most daring and personal work to date, at once bleak as the deep blue void and hopeful as it confronts our fragility.
It will undoubtedly become part of the canon of art that both roots the viewer and, at the same time, leaves the viewer unsettled. An indelible masterpiece.
Kirsten Dunst finally received the critical acclaim she deserved for her astonishing lead performance, winning the Best Actress award from the Cannes Film Festival jury. One of the best performances of the last decade.
Charlotte Gainsbourg was also awarded for Supporting Actress, but sadly the Academy overlooked both incredible performances.
Financially, with a modest budget of $15 million, Melancholia ended up grossing $24 million worldwide. Respectable figures, given its desperate art-house nature. Clearly it was aimed at an audience hungry for existential meditation on the big screen.