MovieChat Forums > Epidemic (1987) Discussion > my opinion, - I think I understand the m...

my opinion, - I think I understand the movie!

posted 17 years ago by haewatein
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I'm a big Lars von Trier fan and as I watched this movie the first time I was extremely dissapointed. It's so strange because it's like a documentary and there is this great story (of the social doctor) IN it and then this extreme end where

SPOILERS: ####where the reality of the movie(s) are melting together connected with the excellent acting of the used medium for the hypnosis####

SPOILERS END

I think I really finally got the movie after watching it 3 times (the second time with Lars von Trier commentary - THAT was very "helpful" and interesting.).

Epidemic simply IS very strange but the problem I think most people have with it is that they don't understand that it's not a pure horror movie or a pure drama or anything but a very loose and subtile homourous picuture that's not completely serious but in some way rather funny. A main reason why it was filmed was that Lars needed a big amount of money for the budget of Europa and so there was this story that the maximum he could get for ONE movie were something like 50.000 Kron and for Europa he needed about 90.000 so he simply took 100.000 (2x 50.000)for two movies and made Europa with a budged ot 90.000 and then... Epidemic for only 10.000 what is nothing as far as I understood it. I'm pretty sure that the amounts are not right here but the proportions are so finally you can imagine what it was about. I'm not Danish (but Austrian) so I have no feeling for the ex-danish currency.

So I think Epidemic is in some way just pretty cool and nice to watch but you mustn't expect any real big and commercial. It's more an underground movie with a lot of humour in it and it's very crazy.
And there are some extreme good scenes in it that I wouldn't like to miss, like the very last one, or of course the movie in the movie (the story of the doctor).

[–] Rez7 13 years ago

<<Epidemic simply IS very strange but the problem I think most people have with it is that they don't understand that it's not a pure horror movie or a pure drama or anything but a very loose and subtile homourous picuture that's not completely serious but in some way rather funny.>>

That's what exactly said about "Idiots" too, not serious, do not expect much bla bla...actually when it's about a great-minded director like Von Trier, we have right to expect much. However his movies before and after "Europa" are quite different and after Europa we have seen much better works from him. Budget doesn't change anything either. Recall "Following" by Nolan with almost no budget which was a mastermind work with great execution. In contrary, Epidemic was slow and the progress of the film could not fulfill the idea of it.