PLOT: An aging, internationally acclaimed European director (Stellan Skarsgård) tries to reconnect with his daughters (Renate Reinsve & Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) while making a new movie with an American star (Elle Fanning) at their family home.
REVIEW: Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value was one of the big hits of the Cannes Film Festival, winning both the Grand Prix and a distribution deal with Neon, who have a superb track record handling high-end European dramas like this. With a powerhouse cast headed by Stellan Skarsgård and Renate Reinsve (star of Trier’s The Worst Person in the World), this seems headed for a whole slew of Oscar nominations, with it likely to be one of the year’s big contenders for Best Foreign Language Film.
It certainly deserves some acting awards as well, with it anchored by a trio of terrific star performances headed by Reinsve. The movie starts in an unforgettable way, with Reinsve’s Nora, a celebrated stage actress in Norway, having a meltdown just before she’s about to go on stage. It turns out that she’s reeling from the death of her mother, and her mental state isn’t helped when her long-absent father, Gustav (Skarsgård), re-enters her life. A celebrated international auteur in the mode of Michael Haneke or Trier himself, he’s trying to launch one last movie after a long period of inaction, and he wants his estranged daughter to star—an idea she finds horrifying.
What makes Trier’s film so engaging is that everyone feels authentic, like people who actually exist rather than highly melodramatic caricatures. Skarsgård has one of his best roles as Gustav, who, despite his arrogance and selfishness, also seems to truly love his daughters, and is a charismatic, sometimes kindly (but sometimes cruel) type who sparks up an unexpected bond with a big Hollywood star (Elle Fanning) who’s found herself taken with his talent after seeing one of his movies at a festival.
While Reinsve and Skarsgård may get most of the accolades, the movie’s unsung hero is Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, in the less showy role of Gustav’s other daughter, the one who isn’t as estranged from him, has a family of her own, and is seen as the glue that holds everyone together. It’s a sneaky performance in that you initially think you have her pigeonholed, only for the layers to be stripped away, exposing a raw nerve. The climactic scenes involving her, Reinsve, and Skarsgård elicited audible sobs at the press screening I attended in how cathartic they are, and it’s clear throughout that we’re in the hands of masters.
Trier’s also made a movie that skillfully juggles tones, with some legitimately hilarious scenes, such as one where Skarsgård brings his young grandson a birthday gift containing several movies he thinks the kid should watch, including Gaspar Noé’s Irreversible, which is as inappropriate a child’s movie as you can get. There are also some fun digs at Netflix and the state of internationally financed films. But then you also get slammed into deeply moving moments, such as a bit where Skarsgård visits an old cinematographer crony and it suddenly, for the first time, occurs to him just how old he is getting.
Sentimental Value is cut from the same cloth as other crowd-pleasing international films like Anatomy of a Fall, I’m Still Here, or Trier’s own The Worst Person in the World, in that they are movies that can be enjoyed by a pretty broad audience. They aren’t just geared for the arthouse, and should translate to a broad base of fans. It’s an excellent family drama, the likes of which we rarely see in mainstream American films anymore (sadly). Hopefully, it earns serious attention for Skarsgård, who must rank as one of the best actors of his generation, with this being perhaps his greatest role in a career filled with them.
