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Overrated and overhyped

i must have seen a different film!!

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Idioterne (1998): As I watched the film, I told myself a thousand times, this is definitely a Von Trier film. It is strange, it is provocative, and of course there are scenes where people are actually having sex, no not faking, but actually having sex. Von Trier is one of the few people who can bring such images into a film and make it into a strangely enigmatic film.To be precise, Lars Von Trier wrote the film. However, the activities that are in the plot are just a bit too important. The film has two things. One, it is a great experience. This film could have been Paosolini's 'Salo', in which I hate because even though there is perfection all around, the film is simply a bit too hard to enjoy because of the over the top violence. 'Idioterne' however, is actually quite fun to watch. I can see how some of the moments in the film might have been controversial, but it doesn't go to the extent of being disturbing. It isn't too sexual. It is simply a fun film.The other thing is the theme of the film. Beneath all the chaos, there is still a theme. The problem is, I do not understand the film yet. I simply had such a compelling experience that I haven't really thought about the film. It is so hard to think while watching this film. But let's try. The film is about a group of people intentionally being idiots because they think that it is deep to bring out the inner idiot that is inside everyone and pass around. But that's when it came to themselves and people they didn't know. In the end, when they came back to their original life, they realize how silly they're actions were and how embarrassing it was. But for some reason, a lady who just came into the group, spassed around the moody house in which her family lived. Of course, everybody thought she was insane, but she didn't care. She was the only one who could pass, and she was only in the group for 2 weeks.I can simply say that the film is trying to say that everybody does have an idiot inside of them. It's just how you control it. And I can easily see how much conversation and theories can come out of the film.But for me, it's more of an experience film. It usually was with Palme' Dor nominees. The film is quite a lot of fun. It may disgust you, it may alienate you. However, I had so much fun. I will admit, I was quite alienated myself. But no matter, that simply means that the film is not perfect.3.5/4

This movie challenged and moved me in so many ways that I know it will take several viewings to fully appreciate it.Many other reviewers have commented on the acting, and as with Festen and Breaking the Waves, the performances are excellent. I would genuinely like to know how people are able to do this.But best of all for me are the themes explored by the movie. I found 'Dancer in the Dark' too dark for my tastes, and 'Antichrist' really turned me off completely. I then watched 'Five Obstructions' and found it amazing (though its a collaboration, of course). With 'The Idiots' I think LVT hits the balance very well. There is enough here to make me laugh, wince, gasp (in disbelief), frown, and develop several lumps in my throat. You can't ask for more than that in a movie.

Never one to shy from a bit of controversy, Danish director Lars Von Trier caused a storm in 1998 with The Idiots. Since then, he has started making American movies that seem almost misogynistic in it's attitudes to women. His films put their female protagonist through horrifying and gruelling psychological and physical abuse. But the controversy stirred up by The Idiots wasn't because of its portrayal of women, but its apparently sadistic mockery of the mentally disabled.The film follows a bunch of young men and women, living together in a large house owned by the uncle of Stoffer (Jens Albinus), who spend their time pretending to be mentally ill and finding their 'inner idiot'. They pick up an apparently lost woman Karen (Bodil Jorgensen) at a restaurant and she joins them, equally fascinated and repulsed by their acts. As Karen searches for her inner idiot, the group continue to 'spas' (Danish equivalent of 'spaz') at various locations, seemingly for their own amusement. Stoffer is meant to be selling the house for his uncle, but since the group has settled their, he uses the group as a means to scare away any potential buyers. However, tensions start to develop in the group, mainly due to the increasingly aggressive and unpredictable behaviour of the unstable Stoffer.It's difficult to work out who exactly Von Trier is poking fun at. It could be the group themselves, who claim to be anti-bourgeois and anti- middle class, yet seem to only use this claim when it frees them from responsibility. A member of the group, who has run away from his wife and his child, thinks about returning, only to describe the thought of pushing his child around in a pram as 'so middle class'. Or the film could be making fun of society's attitudes to the mentally disabled. When a potential buyer for the house is told by Stoffer that a house for the mentally ill has opened next door, the woman is clearly uncomfortable at the idea of them encroaching on their ideal middle class existence. When the group surrounds her, she panics and flees, most likely never to return. It is not a film that lays out its purpose as clear as day. If there is a social message in the film at all is again unclear. What is clear is that The Idiots is a challenging, frustrating, funny, intelligent and extremely uncomfortable film. Von Trier's desire to be as controversial as possible has been evident in the majority of his films - the clitoris removal in Antichrist, the cold, brutal ending of Dancer In The Dark. I usually find annoying in a filmmaker (Gaspar Noe comes to mind, apart from his exceptional Irreversible), but Von Trier's ability to genuinely unsettle is the work of an extremely interesting and gifted filmmaker. Although it breaks many of the rules, The Idiots is the second film in the Dogme '95 manifesto, started by Thomas Vinterberg's Festen, using natural light, hand-held cameras, and avoiding anything implicating genre or superficial action. The film also depicts apparently un- simulated hardcore sex, in a highly controversial scene in which the group take place in a gang-bang while in their 'idiot' character-mode.A love-it-or-hate-it film, but I found it truly original and fascinating. www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

I watched this a long time ago but never reviewed it. The Idiots' is a film directed by Lars Von Trier in 1998, it was made in compliance with the Dogme '95 Manifesto; an avant-garde filmmaking movement started in 1995, and was his first film. 'The Idiot's' focuses upon the tale of a group of people who feign mental disabilities in pursuit of their 'inner idiot', their 'spassing out' is an attempt to release their inhibitions.The film was deemed shocking, despite many disability groups approving of the film and agreeing that it exposed underlying social prejudices against disability. Micro-elements contributed to the shocking effect which this film induced upon some audiences. Realism was used to suspend the audiences sense of disbelief, such was achieved through sound, which was mainly diegetic. The dialogue seems real, unrehearsed and alike to everyday conversation but for the content of the conversations between characters. In making the dialogue believable, and in casting the characters to be believable, the film seems more real, thereby engaging the audience attention, forcing them to relate to it. The shock value is inevitably heightened.My personal interpretation of the film is that it aims to educate the audience about society's general view and attitude towards disabled people. The female main character begins oblivious to the groups intentions and ways (like the audience) and as she is led into their world so is the audience. The film seems to be about seeking deeper meanings, and sharing different perspectives, whether it be sharing the perspectives of someone completely healthy, someone disabled, someone inside the group or outside of it. I think that initially the main character acts as a representation of the ignorance of a lot of people to disability, and is a tool within the film to educate the audience. The film does not seem to hold bias as to a certain perspective, but rather it is exploratory of different perspectives, whether they be shown through conflict between the characters, or contrast between general society and the group.I highly recommend this film, and suggest viewers put aside their judgements until the credits scroll.