Ken Woodgate
‘Gotta Dance’ (in the Dark): Lars von Trier’s Critique of the Musical Genre
This chapter investigates Lars von Trier’s critique of the musical in his film Dancer in the Dark (2000) both through various aspects of the outer musical itself and through the obvious refer- ences to the classic Broadway/Hollywood musicals 42nd Street and The Sound of Music. Particu- larly important is the cross-cultural perspective: the outer musical presents a European’s view of America which is counterposed to an Americanised view of Europe. The outer musical serves to discredit the inner ones, and hence the film argues against the musical genre. Nevertheless, a metacritical reading of the film will identify the limits of von Trier’s dismissive critique.
Of all genres of performance, the musical must be the most self-referential. Putting on a show is, along with falling in love, the musical’s favorite theme. Actors who spontaneously burst into song gain some kind of credibility if they are seen to be mounting their own song-and-dance show. But the ease with which the musical mirrors itself might well be seen, from a rationalistic point of view, as a form of theatrical narcissism, or even syllogism. Does the classic musical say anything, apart from the fact that it is fun to sing and dance? And given that the vast majority of people in the modern industrial- ised world choose to avoid public performances of dancing and absolutely all performances of singing, it could easily be argued that the musical’s promise of fun is simply an illusion of an illusion, an indulgent celebration of theatri- cal posturing. It is strange, to say the least, for a realist director to make a film with song and dance numbers in it. But this is precisely what Lars von Trier did in his film Dancer in the Dark (2000). Along with Thomas Vinterberg, von Trier co-wrote Dogme 95, that controversial manifesto calling for a return to rigor- ous realism in filmmaking:
To DOGME 95 the movie is not illusion! Today a technological storm is raging of which the result is the elevation of cosmetics to God. By using new technology anyone at any time can 394 Ken Woodgate
wash the last grains of truth away in the deadly embrace of sensation. The illusions are everything the movie can hide behind. 1
Dogme 95 can be seen as a recent manifestation of the anti-Hollywood, anti- illusionist tendencies that previously occurred in such movements as Russian Constructivism, Italian Neorealism and the French nouvelle vague. The most obvious hallmarks of Dogme films are a disregard for continuity editing, the avoidance, as much as possible, of post-synchronised sound (point 2 of Dogme’s ‘Vow of Chastity’), and the extensive use of the hand-held camera (point 3), which results in a highly characteristic swish-pan movement from frame to frame. Given that the musical has never been and can never be successfully or seriously integrated into a realist program, von Trier’s approach implies from the outset a critical compromise between two quite distinct generically deter- mined codes. Von Trier has never actually called Dancer in the Dark a Dogme film; indeed, he stated in 1998 that he had moved on from the stric- tures of the program.2 Nevertheless, the hallmarks previously mentioned are abundantly evident in Dancer in the Dark. The film is set in semi-rural Washington State in 1964, and Selma, a Czech immigrant, works in a metal-stamping factory, trying to support her- self and her son Eugene. Together they live in a small bungalow at the back of a property belonging to the local policeman Bill and his spendthrift wife Linda. Selma has an hereditary eye problem and is slowly going blind. She is trying to save enough money to enable her son to undergo an operation that will make sure that he does suffer the same fate as she. In the free time that is left to her, Selma goes to the cinema to watch musicals and participates in the local amateur theatrical group’s production of The Sound of Music, in which she has been given role of Maria. One evening, Bill reveals to Selma that he is in desperate financial trouble and unable to support his wife’s lifestyle. Selma also reveals a secret: she is stashing away her money for her son’s operation. Bill takes the money some time later, and tells his wife that Selma has been making advances in his di-
1 Dogme 95: The Official Dogme 95 Website at