Melancholia

Like most people, we watch quite a few movies. Most are okay to pretty good, or at least worth watching even if I wouldn't go out of my way to recommend them. Occasionally one comes along that inspires a lot of thought, inspiration, and conversations afterward. They leave a mark, and this movie was one of those. It's easy to tell that this is a movie that will usually not leave people in a neutral state, you will love it or hate it. I loved it. If you felt differently, let's try not to hold that against each other.

It's a film in two parts, very separate but joined. Many other elements are presented in pairs for contrast.

It's very surrealistic, and heavy with symbolism. I would say that the movie is about depression, futility, meaningfulness of life, and, oh yes, a planetary flyby. A lot of movies deal with the topic of possible cataclysm, but most of them are formulaic action pictures.

These flybys (close calls when an asteroid's orbit brings it near earth) seem to happen all the time... and, in fact, on the very night we watched this movie on DVD there was a flyby called 2012 FA57. More on some of these events on space.com and NASA's JPL (where you will find a bit more solid science). Along with those current events, add April's spectacular full moon to the dark visual beauty in the movie and it made for a haunting experience for us.

I don't think I could put a label on this one.