h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This tiny, arthouse movie (by the same director as "Dancer in the Dark" starring Bjork)was the first movie my current boyfriend and I saw together. He invited me over and said he'd rented a movie. Now, my guy is a big, hulking, hair down to his bum singer in a Heavy Metal band. I figured we were gonna see "Judge Dredd" or something equally enlightening.

"Breaking the Waves" is a truly tragic tale about a young woman in a small town who, against her family's wishes, marries a man who works on an oil rig. She only gets to see him for a few days every three months, which is bad enough, but whenever he isn't around, her family berates her for marrying someone who isn't there to take care of her.

While on the rig, he gets in an accident that nearly kills him and leaves him paralyzed from the waist down. He is brought home and taken care of by the girl and her family, but slowly becomes rather deranged from being cooped up in bed all the time.

(To this day, whenever my boyfriend goes on the road with his band for days or weeks at a time, we refer to it as his "being on the rig.")

** spoiler ! **

If you haven't seen this movie, I advise that you don't read any further. The ending is heartwrenching and left me in tears.

The husband tells his wife he wants her to find men to have sex with and then tell him about it. At first she's apalled, but reluctantly agrees and sets out to seduce whomever she can find. Months go by and finally she goes too far by boarding a fishing boat where she is brutally raped and killed.

This is tragic enough, but the real kicker is in one of the last shots of the movie, we see her husband walking with the aid of crutches following her funeral.

Talk about life not being fair.

I'm sorry, but Breaking the Waves was just plain WEIRD. Now, I like art movies (see my Betty Blue posting), but this was pushing the envelope for me.

I'm told it's a 'good examination of a girl's conflicting imperatives', but I found it a little slow and impenetrable (even by my standards). It was difficult (for me) to work up any empathy for the characters, so I began to lose interest in it.

--
Talith

I pretty much felt the same way you do, until I started questioning my boyfriend why he liked the movie. He said he could empathize with the girl's lonliness, isolation and desperation.

I'm glad you posted about Betty Blue. I've never seen it, but now I'll have to!