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Reviews
Mrs Dalloway (1997)
No plot, but you should expect it
This movie is a good transposition of the Woolf's novel. Woolf is famous for the almost complete lack of plot of her books (leaving apart the first one, some very few short stories, and Orlando), being interested in writing about what characters are thinking of, and not about what they're actually doing or saying. It was a challenge for the director and the cast, but the result is OK. The weak points are: the first sequence (a short narration about Septimus during second world war: everyone can understand what happened without looking at it, and its "style" is somehow inconsistent with the rest of the movie) and the music, which was rather poorly chosen or written (in a movie in which there is little dialog and a lot of close up of people "thinking" the soundtrack should deserve greater attention). Very good casting and acting (everyone, not just the two leading roles) and gorgeous cinematography.
However, if you like movies in which something does actually happen, don't choose this one. And if you are looking for something that perfectly "capture" the complex description of the feelings of Clarissa and Septimus... read a book and don't watch a movie.
Epidemic (1987)
A Lars' joke
Lars Von Trier seems to be able to make just two kind of movie: awful ones and excellent ones. Epidemic has been scheduled in order to obtain money for another movie - Lars intended to ask money for two different movies and to use almost all of the money to realize the first one (Europe), leaving few dollars to realize the second one (Epidemic). Epidemic has no script, no actors and almost no director. It's just a funny joke. It can be amusing if you are really involved with Lars, Niels, and his wife, otherwise it makes no sense. I rate one star just because it is not possible to write "rating does not apply". If you are interested in Lars Von Trier visual and poetic art, try to consider before the more recent (and in some way, more "accessible") works like "Breaking the Waves", "Dancer in the Dark", and "Dogville". "Europa" can be the following step and, if you like it, maybe "Idioterne" and "Forbrydelsens element" can be the following one. The TV series "Riget" I and II are really enjoyable and are an all-audience product - Lars said it made them just for money. Obviously, they're not a mixture of "E.R." and "Twin Peaks", as someone said. The style of "Epidemic" is very similar to that of "Riget", but the plot is meaningless. From a certain point of view, "Epidemic" is like an home made movie: it can be funny according to the ones who made it, and maybe it can be appreciated by their friends, but shouldn't be programmed on the big screen (...unless someone has given you some money to make it...)