Emotionally intricate. Complex. Mature. Descriptions such as these don’t get used often enough when discussing modern films, as a large number of today’s pictures are too skittish in trying to make audiences think. A most welcome return to filmmaking with a soul, Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value is the kind of intricate human drama that reminds us how powerful the art of cinema can be.
Trier’s films are always well-written and tackle honest issues regarding modern life for men and women and families. His 2022 Oscar-nominated film, The Worst Person in the World, was quite good, but never felt as if the screenplay thoroughly examined the soul of its main character. Sentimental Value finds Trier with his finest work to date. The filmmaker has created a profound examination of a family in conflict and generational betrayal that is as smart as it is touching.
In the performance of his career, Stellan Skarsgård is Gustav Borg, a film director that is distanced from his two adult daughters, Nora (Renate Reinsve) and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas). The siblings find their father returning to their lives after the death of their mother, arriving at their family home after the funeral and inserting himself back into the family he abandoned long ago.
One can feel the influence of both Ingmar Bergman and Louis Malle as the house becomes a stage where the father and his daughters walk through the ghosts of their pain. Characters move through the rooms of the now quiet home, working through the emotional detritus left behind by generations of sorrow. Death and abandonment continue to co-exist with the Borg family, sometimes hand in hand. The one constant being the tragedy of Gustav’s mother (Vilde Søyland) and her victimization by the Nazis when they occupied Oslo. When Nora was young, she wrote stories in the voice of the house where it became more than a dwelling. The house would embrace the family’s pain, giving them shelter from the invading Nazis. Gustav’s family history is embedded in the inner workings of every inch of the house; every redesign and upgrade unable to hide the Borg family’s stories of woe.
Gustav has come to pay his respects to his ex-wife and mother of his children, but his true wish is that his daughters can move beyond the thick fog of his past sins and accept him as a father. While Agnes is more tolerant and welcoming, Nora has a harder shell and holds too many resentments. After Gustav chose a life of fortune and fame, Nora desired to to separate herself from her father’s betrayal. Both sisters performed in their father’s early films. Agnes chose to be a wife and mother while Nora became a respected stage actress who now suffers from a crippling stage fright.
Agnes has a good marriage and seems content. Nora has a fractured love life, as an affair with her married costar, Jakob (Anders Danielsen Lie) gives her what she needs at the moment. They meet, have sex, talk, and then her lover returns to his wife. Jakob is safe and there is no danger of abandonment. The two lovers are not exclusive. Nora understands this can never last, but the scars from her father’s abandonment prevent her from allowing herself to open up to any real romantic commitments.
Gustav has written a film for Nora, telling her she “must” play the role and that no one else could do it. His daughter tells him no and stands firm in her decision and will not even read her part. At a retrospective of his work, Gustav meets popular American actress Rachel Kemp (a charming Elle Fanning), and eventually offers her the role. This would be his first film in over 15 years and he knows this could have been the one to bring him closer to Nora. As he begins rehearsals, it becomes obvious that Gustav realizes he has made the wrong decision. Perhaps he only offered Rachel the role as some sort of retribution for his daughter’s dismissiveness. Rachel struggles to find the core of her character and her director offers no help nor insight. The actress simply cannot connect to the part. Bordering on cruelty when making Rachel dig deeper, Gustav understands the situation is lost, accepting himself as a filmmaker who is sinking his own work and a father without a connection to his daughters.
Amongst all the anger and resentment, Sentimental Value finds a tenderness in the relationship between the sisters. Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas are completely natural in their performance. When Nora and Agnes are together, they become the lights that brighten their surroundings, which have long been shrouded in intergenerational suffering. Gustov’s unexpected (and somewhat unwelcome) return has become the catalyst to the sisters’ mutual roads to acceptance. Trier crafted the screenplay with his writing partner, Eskil Vogt and the two don’t give the sisters an easy “out” as they try to find their way to a balanced existence. Trier and Vogt’s thoughtful and affecting screenplay is not drawn with simplistic moments of tear-stained catharsis, nor is it manipulative in its drama.
While still filled with ego, Gustav has a certain charm. Initially, his smiling demeanor is off putting as we see the way his mere presence takes the wind out of everyone in the room. Stellan Skarsgård skillfully lets the audience glimpse the guilt that hides behind Gustov’s warm face. The way he treats Rachel Kemp taps into the cruelty of abandoning his family. Gustav has the fame and fortune and respect of his peers, but he doesn’t have his daughters, especially Nora who casts him as a villain. All the accolades in the world cannot absolve one’s troubled soul. As Gustav spends time with his grandson Erik (Øyvind Hesjedal Loven) and finds the door to Nora’s heart slammed shut, he comes to terms with a past that has stood waiting. Skarsgård bares his character’s soul, but doesn’t give him grace. This is a deeply felt performance of heartbreaking honesty. The actor has never been so powerful.
Joachim Trier has taken a delicate and unobtrusive approach to telling this story. His direction is patient and the actors are allowed the space they require to let their characters grow. Every moment has a lived-in feel, as if we have known these people for decades. There is a rich naturality to the multilayered screenplay that may lead some to profound tears. Audiences will never find a hint of melodrama in Trier’s sad and poetic masterwork.
Sad, funny, and quietly moving, Sentimental Value is an absolutely sublime motion picture.
Sentimental Value
Written by Joachim Trier & Eskil Vogt
Directed by Joachim Trier
Starring Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, Elle Fanning, Anders Danielsen Lie, Øyvind Hesjedal Loven
R, 133 Minutes, Neon
