The Idiots

A group of adults behave in public as if they were mentally disabled. They call it spassing, and the point is both to break bourgeois politeness and to release something in themselves. Karen joins, and the whole thing narrows to one question: can you do it in your own life, in front of the people who know you. It is Lars von Trier's first Dogme 95 film, officially Dogme 2. He wrote the script in four days. He operated the camera himself. Shot on a Sony DCR-VX1000, it is among the first narrative features made entirely on digital. The manifesto was strict; in his production notes von Trier confessed to breaking the rules four times. The budget was 2.5 million dollars and the production was a six-country collaboration. It was nominated for the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Rotten Tomatoes sits at 73 percent and the critics split: A. O. Scott called it semi-pornographic, Owen Gleiberman defended it as raw and provocative. The argument centred both on the unsimulated sex and on the representation of disability. Who it is for: viewers who want to see what Dogme 95 actually meant on screen. Who it is not for: most people. The film uses imitated disability as a provocation, and both defending it and being disgusted by it are legitimate responses.