Every so often, I find films that are designed for film snobs and I really take pleasure in saying how much I hate the film. While I love international films and even art films, I just can't stand the notion of incomprehensibly bad films being seen as artistic triumphs by people who judge the quality of a film by how confusing it is. If the average person says "it makes no sense", then you are sure that pseudo-intellectual snobs will adore it--perhaps because they think that this somehow makes them smarter than the other 99% who see the film and think it stinks. Such a film is NOCTURNE.
So why is NOCTURNE adored by the few? Well, first off, it was created by Lars Von Trier--a founder of the "Dogme 95" film movement. Dogme 95 is an avant-garde film movement that adheres to a long list of "musts" in order for a film to be "worthy". In many ways, the movement was like the French New Wave, but in Denmark in the 1980s. An obscure and elitist film movement--now THAT'S something film snobs love!! Second, NOCTURNE is filled with sloppy camera-work, confusing scenes and an unsatisfying conclusion--things that film snobs adore with a passion!
If this sound like your thing, then by all means watch. As for me, life's too short to watch unappealing and pretentious films like this.
By the way, this film is part of the CINEMA 16: European Shorts DVD. On this DVD are 16 shorts. Most aren't great, though because it contains THE MAN WITHOUT A HEAD, COPY SHOP, RABBIT and WASP, it's an amazing DVD for lovers of short films and well worth buying. Fortunately, NOCTURNE is the worst film in the set--it only gets better.
