by Eleanor Mannikka
synopsis
In this thought-provoking graduate film of student Lars von Trier, the behavior of Danish resistance fighters at the end of World War II is called into question by documentary footage of them making street arrests and by fictional enactments of crimes. In one sequence, a captive German officer escapes prison and is led into a trap in the forest by a Danish woman -- she believes he was responsible for blinding a teenager, and she stabs his eyes through with a wooden blade. He is left to crawl in the very woods where as a child, he had tried to converse with the birds. Using both color and black-and-white to good advantage, the cinematography adds to the dramatic impact.
