The amount of 10/10 reviews are absolutely ridiculous. Pay them no heed. 1/10 is also similarly ridiculous, as there are positive take-aways (I enjoyed Dillon's neuroticism, and the first quarter of the film is genuinely funny). However, it ends up being nothing more than a competently produced film with almost no substance, an 'anthology' with no clear direction, and an overarching 'theme' ending up as an afterthought more than anything else.
'Shocked audiences at Cannes'...yes, cheap shocks. What could have been, in concept, a wonderful blend of comedy and horror falls flat, with the identity of the film never fully fledging itself out. Is it a dark comedy? One could argue this with the start. Is it von Trier lashing out at accusations of misogyny and pretentiousness by doubling down on both? There's plenty of proof for this argument as well. Is it an exploration into the nature of evil and psychopathy, and what constitutes art and artistic expression? It could have been, but it's never explored deeper than the usual tropes.
I think what upsets me the most about this film is how asinine it is, BECAUSE of the 'shocking' nature of it. It approaches self-parody at times, with brutality being used for no other purpose other than to make audiences cringe. If the elements serve no purpose other than shock, what is redeeming about it?
'The House That Jack Built' as a dark comedy - this would have worked fantastically, as there are legitimately funny (darkly funny, but funny nonetheless) moments in this film; the rising frustration at a broken car jack, the interchange between him and the woman behind the locked screen door, the blundering act with the police officer, the creation of the waving child before his body fully froze. The issue is that the film never fully embraces this (think American Psycho, where the film adaptation of the book softens the brutality and opts for dark, absurd comedy throughout).
'The House That Jack Built' as a personal commentary of von Trier - there is also evidence of this, and in spades. The narration throughout between Jack and 'Verge' (Virgil? Hell's guide?) approaches breaking the 4th wall, between commentary of the film and commentary on von Trier's own body of work as a whole. The self-masturbation was palpable, but it is is fully confirmed near the end, when he uses footage from his own films as supporting evidence. However, this wasn't fully embraced either because the accusations against him of being a pretentious misonynyst, instead of deflecting from them, or justifying them via the commentary itself, are merely confirmed throughout the film; brutal violence is only employed against women, with very graphic shots of strangulation, bludgeoning, and even slicing off a woman's breasts) and Verge even points this out in the film. Men are killed, sure, but never sadistically. The final trap of killing 5 men with a single bullet feels merciful more than anything. Was von Trier purposefully doubling down on accusations of misogyny by ramping up the misogyny? What meta-commentary is he trying to do here? This is a cheap self-analysis of his own work, a blatant lack of self-awareness.
'The House That Jack Built' as an exploration into the nature of evil, psychopathy, and artistic expression - throughout the whole film, Jack again and again mentions that he is an artist - in a literal sense, being an engineer-turned-architect, wanting to design and built his perfect edifice - which he demolishes and rebuilds over and over again; but also in an attempt to blur the line between artistry and psychopathy/evil, by making art out of his murders - comically posed photographs of his victims, presentations of his hunting which include culled crows, along with his family - even this idea is only half-baked, as only some of his murders fall into this. The most pervasive thought I had was that Jack was a pseudo-intellectual narcissist who overestimated his own intelligence, proved by his own failures as an architect, his basic views of art, and I thought whether this was in itself some kind of meta-commentary von Trier was making of himself, ironically - does he view himself as Jack thinks he does, or as Jack actually is? The reviews that state that Jack is a 'genius' are baffling - the movie makes it clear that luck, or divine providence, are instrumental in Jack's success - there are blunders and lack of preparation, in almost every instance. He even voices his lack of repercussion for anything he's ever done, which is why these interpretations of him as a 'genius killer' are baffling to me. The creation of the house from the corpses was almost so obvious, I was hoping it wouldn't actually happen - but it does, to my dismay. And at this point, the shocks are non-existent. The parallels between personal evil and the 'great evils' (Hitler, Idi Amin, Mussolini, genocide, etc) are so fundamentally basic that it must be a piss-take by von Trier.
Which leads me to the following: Is von Trier so self-aware that he would make a film as a parody-commentary of his own body of work and his approach to film-making? Or is he so self-absorbed that he doesn't see that it's become a parody of himself, and he can produce half-baked films to (as evidenced by the user reviews here) riotous reception and being lauded a 'cinema genius'? I don't know, and I don't care to spend more time pondering this question, because I don't believe he is the genius that the cult of personality around him would paint him as. I believe he has produced genuinely beautiful (if haunting) films, with 'Dancer in the Dark' and 'Dogville', but the reliance of shock as a means to push films has gone full circle into self-parody now, and being self-aware of this as he may be, doesn't justify the pseudo-artistry of it.
'Shocked audiences at Cannes'...yes, cheap shocks. What could have been, in concept, a wonderful blend of comedy and horror falls flat, with the identity of the film never fully fledging itself out. Is it a dark comedy? One could argue this with the start. Is it von Trier lashing out at accusations of misogyny and pretentiousness by doubling down on both? There's plenty of proof for this argument as well. Is it an exploration into the nature of evil and psychopathy, and what constitutes art and artistic expression? It could have been, but it's never explored deeper than the usual tropes.
I think what upsets me the most about this film is how asinine it is, BECAUSE of the 'shocking' nature of it. It approaches self-parody at times, with brutality being used for no other purpose other than to make audiences cringe. If the elements serve no purpose other than shock, what is redeeming about it?
'The House That Jack Built' as a dark comedy - this would have worked fantastically, as there are legitimately funny (darkly funny, but funny nonetheless) moments in this film; the rising frustration at a broken car jack, the interchange between him and the woman behind the locked screen door, the blundering act with the police officer, the creation of the waving child before his body fully froze. The issue is that the film never fully embraces this (think American Psycho, where the film adaptation of the book softens the brutality and opts for dark, absurd comedy throughout).
'The House That Jack Built' as a personal commentary of von Trier - there is also evidence of this, and in spades. The narration throughout between Jack and 'Verge' (Virgil? Hell's guide?) approaches breaking the 4th wall, between commentary of the film and commentary on von Trier's own body of work as a whole. The self-masturbation was palpable, but it is is fully confirmed near the end, when he uses footage from his own films as supporting evidence. However, this wasn't fully embraced either because the accusations against him of being a pretentious misonynyst, instead of deflecting from them, or justifying them via the commentary itself, are merely confirmed throughout the film; brutal violence is only employed against women, with very graphic shots of strangulation, bludgeoning, and even slicing off a woman's breasts) and Verge even points this out in the film. Men are killed, sure, but never sadistically. The final trap of killing 5 men with a single bullet feels merciful more than anything. Was von Trier purposefully doubling down on accusations of misogyny by ramping up the misogyny? What meta-commentary is he trying to do here? This is a cheap self-analysis of his own work, a blatant lack of self-awareness.
'The House That Jack Built' as an exploration into the nature of evil, psychopathy, and artistic expression - throughout the whole film, Jack again and again mentions that he is an artist - in a literal sense, being an engineer-turned-architect, wanting to design and built his perfect edifice - which he demolishes and rebuilds over and over again; but also in an attempt to blur the line between artistry and psychopathy/evil, by making art out of his murders - comically posed photographs of his victims, presentations of his hunting which include culled crows, along with his family - even this idea is only half-baked, as only some of his murders fall into this. The most pervasive thought I had was that Jack was a pseudo-intellectual narcissist who overestimated his own intelligence, proved by his own failures as an architect, his basic views of art, and I thought whether this was in itself some kind of meta-commentary von Trier was making of himself, ironically - does he view himself as Jack thinks he does, or as Jack actually is? The reviews that state that Jack is a 'genius' are baffling - the movie makes it clear that luck, or divine providence, are instrumental in Jack's success - there are blunders and lack of preparation, in almost every instance. He even voices his lack of repercussion for anything he's ever done, which is why these interpretations of him as a 'genius killer' are baffling to me. The creation of the house from the corpses was almost so obvious, I was hoping it wouldn't actually happen - but it does, to my dismay. And at this point, the shocks are non-existent. The parallels between personal evil and the 'great evils' (Hitler, Idi Amin, Mussolini, genocide, etc) are so fundamentally basic that it must be a piss-take by von Trier.
Which leads me to the following: Is von Trier so self-aware that he would make a film as a parody-commentary of his own body of work and his approach to film-making? Or is he so self-absorbed that he doesn't see that it's become a parody of himself, and he can produce half-baked films to (as evidenced by the user reviews here) riotous reception and being lauded a 'cinema genius'? I don't know, and I don't care to spend more time pondering this question, because I don't believe he is the genius that the cult of personality around him would paint him as. I believe he has produced genuinely beautiful (if haunting) films, with 'Dancer in the Dark' and 'Dogville', but the reliance of shock as a means to push films has gone full circle into self-parody now, and being self-aware of this as he may be, doesn't justify the pseudo-artistry of it.