Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Nicolas Winding Refn
Famous for directing the gritty and violent
Pusher
trilogy,
which explores the criminal underworld of Copenhagen. His film, the US 'art-house noir'
Drive,
won him the Best Director award at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival.
And then there's Lars von Trier…
Top Danish Films
Pelle the Conqueror
(1987)
Babette's Feast
(1987)
Breaking the Waves
(1996)
In a Better World
(2010)
The Hunt
(2012)
Speed Walking
(2014)
Lars von Trier & Dogme95
Whether he's depicting explicit sexual encounters in
Nymphomaniac
(2013), the apoca-
lypse in
Melancholia
(2011), or framing female genital mutilation in the polarising
Anti-
christ
(2009), there is little doubt that the leading Danish director and screenwriter of the
21st century remains Lars von Trier, who continues to live up to his label as the film
world's
enfant terrible.
Von Trier's better-known films include the melodrama
Breaking the Waves
(1996),
which featured Emily Watson and took the Cannes Film Festival's Grand Prix;
Dancer in
the Dark
(2000), a musical starring Icelandic pop singer Björk and Catherine Deneuve,
which won Cannes' Palme d'Or in 2000; and the frequently difficult and experimental
Do-
gville
(2003), starring Nicole Kidman.
Von Trier is a cofounder of Dogme95, sometimes dubbed the 'vow of chastity'. This
artistic manifesto pledged a minimalist approach to filmmaking using only hand-held cam-
eras, shooting on location with natural light and rejecting the use of special effects and
pre-recorded music. It attracted both ardent fans and widespread dismissal, but its impact
and influence on modern cinema cannot be underestimated.
