Woldemarow

Woldemarow is an alegorical movie by the Scandinavian director Lars von Trier. It is at first sight a criticism of neocapitalism, but, however, by the example of a neocapitalist town it largely criticises the moral breakdown and the corruption (materialism) of the humanity in general.

Plot

The movie begins with the narrator narrating a story how people, wanting to establish the place with higher moral values than anywhere else and the one that they could call their home, established a town (known as Woldemarow, called after the "great leader Woldemar who lived half the globe away") in an "uninhabitable nowhere". In the start of the movie the tone is generally positive and people are shown as happy. An interesting way is chosen to present the film to the viewers - at first, everything is dark, while with the building of the new town and a new community lights starts appearing in various places.

Later it is shown how the greediness of some indviduals destroys the feeling of the community and eventually the town. These views gradually passes from these few indviduals to the majority and the slow change of values means that the town adopts values very different from the original ones that led to establishment of the town - or, more accurately, perhaps similar, but way more radical. The unwritten laws that used to be something needed to keep the order become a machine that is used to destroy enemies or those who are unable to fit in the community.

Whole story is told through the eyes of a young woman whose life degrades rapidly. She herself becomes a slave of those in power; the story reaches its climax when one of her children is voted by the community to be killed because he is blind and thus "not good enough for the people of Woldemarow" (and he is killed in a shocking scene where he is taken to "even more uninhabittable wilderness" by the elders without saying a word to him). Her daughter, who was also sick, on the other hand, is not killed, but rather becomes a sex slave of the town's elite. The main character is blackmailed into renting her daughter for a year (by the time, people already became a form of property in Woldemarow and there are even some suggestions of cannibalism). The fact of paedophilia is well known in Woldemarow, but nobody dares to say a word against it, because they fear that they would be "voted out" and left in the wilderness.

The hapiness of the community is destroyed and actually everyone becomes slaves of The Order, although previously it seemed that this order would make everybody free. At this point, the movie more or less narrates the views and thoughs of many people of the town and it becomes clear that nobody is happy with the way things are going, but could not leave the community for various reasons. Even the "leaders" (although officially all people are equal and there are no leaders) are not happy.

At the end, the lighthouse of Woldemarow (the building that provided most of the symbolic light in the movie) is destroyed by fire and it remains unclear werether that was because of thunder or because somebody used the weaponry that was stockpiled against the "possible attack by the bandits" that never happened (thunder is blamed, because everybody claims that nobody could ever do such a thing in Woldemarow - even though the majority disagrees themselves with what they loudly say. Here is one of the allegories that are common in the movie, as Thunder (Perkūnas) is the main God in the Baltic paganism, and Woldemarow is allegedly based on Voldemaravas in Free Lithuania. So, supposedly the people rather blame God than look for their own faults).

At the same night, the main character is found with her wrists slashed and yet again it is unclear werether she had committed suicide or was killed.

Controversies

The movie is largely controversial. It is commonly believed that the movie is based on the town of Voldemaravas in Free Lithuania, although actually various historical details differs. The movie have raised an outcry in Free Lithuania, among the neocapitalists elsewhere, in the Alliance for Public Decency (due to graphic rape scenes of underaged children among other reasons).

While the voice of the small nation of Free Lithuania was not heard very loudly due to the size of that nation, there were protests against the movie in the RTC and elsewhere as well. The director denied that the film is based on any real events or place, despite of the similarity of the fictional town's name to Voldemaravas in Free Lithuania. He claimed that "Woldemarow could be anywhere".

This page was created by Abdul-aziz.