Comments on: Melancholia

By: Cory

Cory — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 18:06:17 +0000

Steve T., a planet traveling at the speed of light? Come on man, that’s just absurd.

By: Lorena

Lorena — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 19:23:36 +0000

I watched it a couple of days ago. Boring. I watched lots of parts on fast forward. The first part of the movie, one hour long, it’s about a woman who is too deppressed and crazy to be happy at her own wedding. Barely a mention of the planet, just a blue star in the constellation Scorpio. The second half is more about the planet colliding with earth, with some lovely imagery, but I kept wondering, such a big planet so close to earth, wouldnt have affected earth before the collision, like taking it out of orbit or something?

By: woundedduck

woundedduck — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 16:15:41 +0000

“…spoiled child of the media”? von Trier was raised in a middle class family, like most people. My research shows the media only had visitation rights every third weekend–hardly enough time to spoil him. Although von Trier is reported to have said the media lavished him with sweet cakes, in secret and against his parents’ wishes, so this could explain his distaste for sugary treats. But as to the effect it had on his filmmaking, it’s tough to say. I’m currently writing a piece for “Film Comment” about the structuralist modalities of post-confectionist lingual markers as they pertain to desserts in von Trier’s films. I’ll keep you posted.

By: dean

dean — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 19:47:35 +0000

Some people are pathetic–at least their understanding of basic science is. The individual who said that a planet was offset by a galactic merger and is now approaching us at the speed of light doesn’t understand that we would see that planet long before it arrived.

It takes light from a distant galaxy millions of years to arrive here on earth and likewise, a planet moving at close to the speed of light would take millions of years to arrive and we would spot it long before it hit.

I write better science fiction that Von Trier, the idiot. He’s just a priviledged spoiled child of the media who probably comes from a wealthy connected family. Get a clue, people, those who have media connections are all very priviledged elites pulling the wool over our heads and they’re actually quite stupid in their understanding of the arts and sciences as this pretentious movie attests.

By: “A beautiful movie about the end of the world” | Intelligent Life

Tue, 03 Jan 2012 23:39:28 +0000

[...] Lars von Trier‘s new film Melancholia. I’d originally heard about it on an astronomy blog, in a post primarily about the film’s scientific impossibility. Now, I’m normally not a [...]

By: Kristen Merino

Kristen Merino — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:25:27 +0000

I watched it last night and loved it. It was beautiful, stunning, moving. With Tristan and Isolde playing in the background, this film unfolds slowly, forcing the viewer to think their way through it. Its not a Hollywood “blow the planet up and save the earth” flick with lots of explosions and action.. in fact, there is no suspense at all. We know the world will end, he lets us know at the beginning (during that spectacular extra-slow motion sequence). The movie is about us, as Morty62 states so perfectly. Moreover, it seems to be an impressive nod to German Romanticism (a personal favorite), with his nods to Wagner and Millais (ok, not German, but still…), and the sense of sturm und drang that pervades the whole film in a manner worthy of Schiller or Goethe.

By: Will

Will — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 21:44:35 +0000

I came by to weigh in and defend this film, but Morty62 said it better than I ever could.

In the end, the movie isn’t really about the end of the world, it’s about death, real, absolute death. We, as humans have come up with numerous ways to comfort ourselves with the knowledge of our own mortality; religion, compartmentalizing, having the knowledge we’ll be missed by at least a handful of people, of that we’ll have left our mark, on the planet in some way, like through the children we leave behind.
In Melancholia’s premise, all the is gone and it asks the viewer to think, really think about their own mortality. It’s not an easy film to sit through, but it’s worth it.
In other words, the science about the end of the world isn’t important, it’s just a MacGuffin.

By: Carlo

Carlo — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 20:08:44 +0000

I recently saw this movie, and the number of scientific inacuracies is stunning. Also I felt that the best thing that could have happened to the characters would have been for a planet to fall on them.

By: Morty62

Morty62 — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 05:06:20 +0000

Melancholia is a beautiful movie that is less about science than it is about how individuals deal with the knowledge that the world may be coming to an end. Von Trier examines things in a microcosm. There is no panic in thr streets or plans to try and avoid our fate. Everything happens on a huge estate and the story revolves around two sisters, one of whom is clinically depressed. I know Von Trier has many detractors, but I find his movies to be emotionally intense and absorbing. They are also beautifully shot. He is not PC at all, which I guess is why so many people dislike his work or boycott his movies out of some misplaced sense of principle. The science of Melancholia may not be credible, but the movie itself is unforgettable and devastating.

By: Mack

Mack — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 01:38:38 +0000

Let’s say that a rogue planet did appear and hit the earth dead on. Let’s say that it is roughly the size of earth and travelling twice the speed of the earth. Can we (meaning you) model what would happen? For example, would the people on the impact side live until the actual collision or would there be shock wave or thermal reaction when the rogue planet entered the atmosphere that would kill everyone a fraction of a second before impact? And what would happen on the opposite side, would the collision be felt immediately? Would the ground immediately fragment killing everyone,? Would people and things be flung into space or turned to jelly by the shock? Could a bunker be hardened enough that anyone could survive such a collision?

By: PJsD

PJsD — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 10:59:36 +0000

It’s a beautiful movie. I was surprised, at first I thought it was going to be that movie about a second earth. I didn’t know anything about this production. Melancholia is partly SF with some very good special effects. The sideplots make it feel like a kind of thriller and it has spooky scenes that are beyond anything I’ve seen in a long time. Nightmarish horror. The opening is breath taking. The movie itself basically is about being depressed. This movie is a classic. The exterior scenes were shot at Tjolöholm Castle. Check it out in Google streetview.

By: rudabaga

rudabaga — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 18:34:00 +0000

Did you guys see it? I loved it. Really loved it. And I was all happy reading the original blog post about how it could never happen and then you guys got all scary with ways it could. Please re-examine now and say this could never happen.

By: ra

ra — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 09:06:19 +0000

if it was aproaching up from south pole would we still see it aproaching???

By: the end

the end — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 11:26:12 +0000

It is entirely plausible. But the governments of the world would know about it. Individuals might discover it, but there are many ways to silence them: free seats in the bunker with all the blondes you can eat; and if that fails murder is ok (and preferable) when you are a sovereign state. To tell the public would be suicide for the state(s). There would be total chaos. You want those economies rolling along to give you time to get your bunkers built. At the last minute all of the rats would disappear into iron mountain and we the people would be left waiting for the end. In fact, the mystery schools have known all along that this event comes around every few thousand years and they hide that knowledge from you to keep themselves in power.The End.

By: Maug

Maug — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 21:58:18 +0000

This looks like it’s going to be the worst move.. EVER. I saw this trailer a few months ago and was speechless, and not in a good way. It looks like a horrible mash-up. Like.. take mixing Deep Impact with The King’s Speech or something. WTF?

By: Gary Ansorge

Gary Ansorge — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 16:24:31 +0000

36. QuietDesperation

We(Americans) seem to be much more tolerant of violence than we are of sexuality(see California vs violent games). Kids can see all the violence they want(at least, when their parents aren’t around) but SEX? Oh no,,,

Sex is why we’re here at all so I suppose anyone who adheres to our popular monotheistic religions has good reason to hate it since they seem to want to go back to heaven. I just wonder why THEY don’t just suicide and get all that angst over with.

Personally, I like earth based religions,,,they’re a lot more fun,,,(see The Wicker Man, original version).

So far, no one has proposed(AFAIK) using a 12 km radius neutron star for their end of the world scenario. Dropping thru the solar system from above the plane of the ecliptic, if it was old enough to be relatively cool, detecting it years before its arrival would be difficult, at least until the gravitational effects became obvious.

,,,or one could have an archaic mini black hole(about the mass of earth and a meter in diameter) pass by,,,really hard to spot,,,

Gary 7

By: Sheila Wolf

Sheila Wolf — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 15:17:47 +0000

i am very interested in movie stuff like that but after the stupid comments of Trier about Hitler in Cannes – i will prefer Another Earth…

By: Maria

Maria — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 14:03:09 +0000

@53. “this must be the first time I’ve ever heard a Lars von Trier film referred to as “lovely.””

Oh I don’t know, ‘Dancer in the Dark’ was at times exquisitely lovely; when it wasn’t busy being a manipulative gut punch to the stomach and a round house kick to the frontal lobe.

@59. Most directors are pompous. But he’s far from being an idiot.

By: realta fuar

realta fuar — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 11:36:11 +0000

Well, OF COURSE IT MATTERS! When a movie gets the science we know NOW wrong, it’s just bad science fiction, by defintion. Writers and directors who can’t be bothered (because no one really cares, right?) to get the basics right don’t deserve our support. Full stop. The fact that the director is also a pompous idiot is not exactly a selling point either.

By: CR

CR — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 06:10:43 +0000

Had some trouble with my computer that prevented me from watching the trailers, but now that I have, I have to say that I’m not impressed enough to see either “Melancholia” nor “Another Earth.”
After “Knowing,” a film I still try to warn people not to waste two hours on, I think I’ll pass on any end-of-the-world type movies. Man, that film really soured my appetite for such things. “Deep Impact” was flawed in many ways, but I didn’t hate it; didn’t really like it, but I didn’t hate it. “Knowing” sucked like a black hole, and although this film (Melancholia) looks very artistic and dream-like, I suspect that its ending will be fairly hopeless. Same with “Another Earth.” From the trailers for both, it appears that the main characters, after being angst-ridden for most of the film, will have some sort of closure/epiphany/cosmic acceptance of their fates and then die anyway in a special-effects laden climax.
Meh.
Give me light and fluffy action sci-fi, like “Cowboys and Aliens.”
I know, what gives, right? Especially after I praised “The Quiet Earth” for its cerbral story and derided the notion of an action-oriented, SFX-laden remake. I think it stems from something going beyond cerebral and drifting too far into that dreamlike state. Sure, all movies show the audience only what the writers/directors want the audience to see, and I for one actually don’t necessarily like films that are so omniscient that I know everything… a bit of mystery/lack of knowledge is GOOD. But both of these films look SO MUCH like a dream that I just want to say, “this is taking too long, time to wake up and have a cooler dream.” (Yes, I have actually done that in some of my dreams! It’s about as close to lucid dreaming as I’ve ever gotten, and it seems to happen only randomly… usually, I’m just along for the ride as my unconscious brain makes stuff up while I sleep. But I digress…)

By: NCC-1701Z

NCC-1701Z — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 02:17:01 +0000

Also, Jack Bauer is in ‘Melancholia.’ He’ll save us…. Though it may take him 24 hours.

By: NCC-1701Z

NCC-1701Z — Tue, 12 Jul 2011 02:12:02 +0000

Speaking of rogue planets about to destroy us, apparently the Nibiru thing is still floating around. It’s suppose to get us next year. Yahoo actually had an article about it on their home page tonight: http://news.yahoo.com/believers-mysterious-planet-nibiru-await-earths-end-103803162.html
On the other hand, Harold Camping’s new end of the world prediction is for November of THIS year, so now I don’t know WHO to believe!!!!

By: cwrohde

cwrohde — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 22:18:28 +0000

Is this just another “we’re all gonna die” “no hope” movie? At least in Wells’ “The Star” a few got off Earth. In the that story, the Bronson star turned out to be a double planet, one noxious and one livable and thawing from frozen at our sweet spot in the solar system – complete with roads and a breathable atmosphere, being left in place of the Earth. It’s noxious twin dragging the smashed Earth off into space. Thus ending on Hope. Read the book! Made into a movie in the ’50s: “When Worlds Collide”(not that great)… -30-

By: aleksandar

aleksandar — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 20:57:16 +0000

Expecting scientific accuracy from a von Trier movie is a bit unjustified. Slim connection to sanity and reality isn’t a given either.

About cosmic interlopers causing great damage and human trauma.
While by now completely technically obsolete, H.G. Wells “The Star” did it best over a century ago.

By: czfinke

czfinke — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 15:19:42 +0000

this must be the first time I’ve ever heard a Lars von Trier film referred to as “lovely.”