DEAR WENDY
Denmark, 2005, 105 minutes, Colour.
Jamie Bell, Bill Pullman, Michael Angarano, Danso Gordon, Novella Nelson, Chris Owen, Alison Pill, Mark Webber.
Directed by Thomas Vinterberg.
Dear Wendy relates to a gun, not a person.
This is a strange and eccentric as well as insightful film written by Lars von Trier. He has set a number of his films in the United States even though he has never visited it. This was particularly true of Dancing in the Dark, his film with Bjork and Catherine Deneuve. It was also true of his trilogy, beginning with Dogville, with Nicole Kidman and moving on to Mandalay with Bryce Howard. These films are indictments of American culture, especially the proneness to violence.
The film, however, was directed by his protégé, Thomas Vinterberg who made an outstanding contribution to the Dogme series and its austere film-making with Festen. He also made the eccentric It’s All About Love with Joachim Phoenix, Clare Danes and Sean Penn.
This film focuses on a young boy in a mining town. He is played by Billy Elliot’s Jamie Bell. When he finds a gun, he is drawn to it, establishes a club with his friends – The Dandies. Their philosophy is a mixture of love for guns and pacifism, they are not to draw their guns. However, with life in the town being particularly ambiguous, they are drawn into gunfights. This is precipitated by the role of the sheriff, Krugsbi, played by Bill Pullman.
Other members of the gang include Michael Angarano (Sky High) and Mark Webber (Winter Solstice, The Hottest State).
The film is a strange mixture of the cerebral, with an emphasis on ideas, with the emotional, audiences being invited to identify with the strange characters and their dilemmas.
1.A Scandinavian perspective on the United States, on gun culture? The writing of Lars von Trier – and his never having visited America? The screenplay? Vinterberg’s direction?
2.The locations – the artificial American town, the tradition of Dogme and other von Trier films in setting up an American location? Theatrical? The mine, the town square? The glimpses of the landscapes outside the town? The film’s action as being confined, staged? The information about the guns given via diagrams, mathematics, formulas?
3.The musical score, the range of songs, the lyrics and their commentary on the action – especially about the season?
4.The framework, the letter to Wendy? Dick’s voice-over? The feeling in the love letters? Wendy and her identity? The revelation that Wendy was the gun? The parallel with the relationship between men and women? The gun as real and symbolic? Dick’s passion, falling in love with Wendy, the development of the relationship, the alienation, the saving? His being killed by Wendy? The film’s paralleling the experience with the gun with a love affair?
5.Dick’s story, the voice-over, the letter and the refrain? His father, wanting him to go into the mine, his father’s life? Dick going down to the mine, coming up again? Pampered by Clarabelle? The muffins and the shop, the meeting with the sheriff – who always referred to him as a good boy? His love for reading? Clarabelle urging him to give Sebastian a gift, going to the shop, the encounter with Susan, buying the gun? Deciding not to give it to him but keep it? Giving him The Picture of Dorian Gray with the pages missing? His work, the supermarket, his friendship with Stevie, meeting the others? Finding the gun and its changing his life?
6.His pacifist ideas, his being bookish? Theoretical? The friendship with Stevie, at work, Stevie and his skill with guns, his talking about the gun from the Civil War? The friendship with Hughie, Hughie’s disability, with Freddie? The younger brother? The meeting with Susan, friendship? The place of the group in the town, their meeting, the growing friendship, the interest in guns and Dick’s philosophy of guns, Stevie’s skill?
7.Hughie and Freddie, the bullying at school, Hughie and his self-assertiveness? Stevie explaining the guns? Susan and her place in the group? Those who were followers, Dick the leader?
8.The idea of the Dandies, the clothes, the rituals, the use of the guns, the pacifist philosophy? The bonds with the guns, the ritual engagement? The names for the guns? The letters? The Dandies and their foppish manner, elegance?
9.The sheriff, his role in the town, seeing Dick as a good boy, bringing Sebastian, the proposal that Dick be a kind of parole officer? Dick and his being unwilling? The past antagonism towards Sebastian? His love for Clarabelle? The supervision? Sebastian and his touching Wendy and Dick’s reaction? The shooting, the rivalry, Dick and his blindfold, Sebastian and his skill?
10.Sebastian and his having killed someone, relationship with Clarabelle? His reaction to the group, thinking they were silly? His skill in shooting? His gradual change, watching the rituals, wanting to become part of the group?
11.Clarabelle, in Dick’s household, looking after him? The muffins? Her retirement, her fear of going out, the plan to escort her, her fear, with the gun, the sudden pulling of the gun and shooting the deputy dead? The return home, the further attempts to take Clarabelle, the success of their mission?
12.The sense of mission, the initial attempt, the failure, the detailed plans, Clarabelle and her killing the deputy? The sheriff and his reaction? The second attempt leading to the siege? The sheriff and his talk, the snipers, the strategies, the atmosphere of High Noon? Each of the members of the group and their death, the pathos of their deaths? Dick taking Clarabelle and achieving success? Stevie and the Civil War gun – and its failing just as in the Civil War? Sebastian seeing that Dick would be shot, in the framework of the window, his getting Wendy, shooting him?
13.The film as realistic or not? A fable? About guns, human nature, pacifism and aggression, the gun culture, self-deception – and American gun culture as seen by European film-makers?
