I'm currently under the weather, and due to this bout of man flu, I set out today in search of a film which I could relate to in my present state.

Melancholia is a film about depression and the end of the world. Written and directed by Lars "Heil" Von Trier, it stars Kirsten Dunst as the young melancholic Justine. The film portrays her family life, starting with her wedding, which just happens to turn into the worst wedding ever, and it's all her fault for being a miserable bitch. Then there's the second half of the film which stars Charlotte Gainsbourg as her sister, Claire, who's scared that the world will end when a planet collides with it. Then a planet collides with it. I don't feel bad about ruining the ending of the film because Lars Von Trier does just that with the first 5 minutes.

The film brilliantly portrays depression during the wedding scenes. Kirsten Dunst's every nuance is spot on, and the way that all of her family don't quite understand her condition and just expect her to cheer up is very well observed. It's also a very good depiction of how drama goes down at an event like a wedding, with lots of people going off into different rooms and talking about it.

The plot is very hard to define, meandering, and grandiose. There are an awful lot of dead-ends and superfluous scenes. The film is split into two "chapters", and these feel quite disconnected. Justine seems like a different person in the second chapter, compared to her almost absent-minded demeanour in the first.

The second chapter goes on about a planet called Melancholia that's going to collide with the earth. We don't really hear about this until half way through the film, at which point everything that was set up in the first chapter is forgotten about. We never meet Justine's husband or mother again, despite them playing very big parts in the first half.

The characters have a tendency to do things almost inexplicably, the highlight of which was Justine practically raping a young man who I'm certain played a retarded boy in another film, though he could just have one of those faces.

The first half of the film is good, if a little dull. The second half is just a bit silly. In summary, Lars Von Trier has done it again. And by that I of course mean he's created yet another pretentious fuck-puddle.