I have wanted to do melodrama for ages. It is great to do, but also very tough on you emotionally," says Lars von Trier, a third-time contender for the Grand Prix at Cannes with his latest feature, Breaking the Waves.
"I just sit there, crying my eyes out during the takes. I swear! Ask! Just ask around! Even the women giggle at me," the Danish director reminisces. "Great floods of tears - and I'm not the only one; the whole unit weeps along, too. At the age I have got to now, I seem to be able to let the crazily-sensitive side of me go…I saw The Lion King with my daughter, and I wept buckets."
When asked about his film's chances, Von Trier, who turned 40 on 1 May, declared with mock sincerity "anything but the Palme d'Or will come as a shock to me". And, in truth, maybe it is not such an impossible dream.
He is, after all, one of the very few European dir-ectors Variety included in its list of the world's top 50 filmmakers. They posed the question: "Can the Euro filmmakers compete in the world market?" And the verdict read: "They can if they are all as interesting and savvy as von Trier."
The genesis of Breaking the Waves began four years ago, when von Trier told Peter Aalbæk Jensen, his partner in Zentropa Entertainments, that he wanted to make a film about sex and religion. It was, of course, the "sex" part of the DKK42 (US$7.4) million production that hit the headlines first. British actress Helena Bonham Carter had originally accepted the female lead, but she pulled out after reading the script because she found the erotic scenes too hot to handle.
The religious element von Trier found on the North West coast of Scotland. "At least you feel closer to God up here," he says of Mallaig, the little fisherman's village, which became the production's location base.
Breaking the Waves is an unusual love story. Bess, played by British newcomer Emily Watson, is a naïve young girl who falls for Jan (Stellan Skarsgård), an oil-rig worker and man-of-the-world.
She lives in a small community that opposes their relationship, but they decide to marry nevertheless. Bess is sure that their love is made in heaven, a belief which is easily confirmed because she seems to have a direct link to the Almighty. Anyway, Jan goes back to the oil-rig and Bess counts the days to his homecoming. When he returns home after an accident which has left him paralysed for life, the real action starts.
Realising that he will be bedridden, and worrying that his wife will cut herself off from a normal life, he assures her that she can aid his recovery by taking a lover and relating to him in graphic detail what she gets up to. Eventually, Bess gets better and better at satisfying his wishes "I employ a style that, on the face of it, may seem a bit weird for broad audiences, but which is nevertheless acceptable," says von Trier, "because the story is 100 per cent undismissable once you get into it. At the same time, the intellectuals will be able to permit themselves to cry because the style is so refined."
Von Trier started collecting prizes at the Danish Film School, and all three of the films he made as a student (1981-1983) won Best Film Awards at the Munich Film Festival. His 1984 feature debut, Element of Crime, bagged the Technical Grand Prix at Cannes, while Epidemic (1987) was screened in the official programme. In 1991, he returned to Cannes with the Competition entry Europa, which lifted both the Technical Grand Prix and the Special Jury Prize.
While fêted around the world and recognised internationally as a significant name in European cinema, von Trier was largely ignored in Denmark, where his films were seen as appealing to a very select art-house audience.
Riget (The Kingdom) changed all that. In preparation on Breaking the Waves, von Trier accepted an offer from Danish pubcaster DR-TV to do a television soap. The four-episode series emptied the streets, and the blown-up theatrical version, which screened at Venice, has added another trophy to his collection.
He is currently preparing another nine instalments, with every confidence that his television public will be enticed back into the cinemas for his Cannes offering.
Jørn Rossing Jensen
Prod Co: Zentropa Entertainments, with Trust Film, Liberator Productions, Argus Film, Northern Lights, La Sept Cinéma, Swedish Television Drama, Media Investment Club, Nordic Film & Television Fund, VPRO Television
Prod: Vibeke Windeløv, Peter Aalbæk Jensen
Dir/Scr: Lars von Trier
Ph: Robby Müller
Ed: Anders Refn
Prod des: Karl Juliusson
Costume: Manon Rasmussen
Cast: Emily Watson, Stellan Skarsgård, Katrin Cartlidge, Jean-Marc Barr, Adrian Rawlins, Jonathan Hackett, Sandra Voe
Running time: 158mins
International sales: World Sales Christa Saredi
