Dancer in the Dark
Dancer In The Dark is a 2000 film about Selma Ježková, a Czech immigrant and single mom who suffers from a hereditary degenerative disease that will inevitably cause her to go blind, who moved to the United States hoping to give her son a surgery that will save him from the same fate.
- Directed by Lars von Trier. Written by Lars von Trier.
You don't need eyes to see. taglines
Selma Ježková
[edit]- In Czechoslovakia, I saw a film, and they were eating candy from a tin just like this. I thought to myself... how wonderful it must be in the United States.
- I've got little games I play when it goes really hard. When I'm working in the factory... and the machines, they make these... rhythms... And I just start dreaming, and it all becomes music.
- Clatter, crash, clack! Racket, bang, thump! Rattle, clang, crack, thud, whack, bam! It's music, now dance!
- I used to dream that I was in a musical coz in a musical nothing dreadful ever happens.
Dialogue
[edit]- Selma: You're fantastic. You just have to listen to your heart, Cvalda.
- Kathy: I don't want you to call me Cvalda.
- Selma: You're Cvalda to me.
- Selma: [in the cinema, asking description of the movie because she can't see] How is she doing?
- Kathy: It's when she cannot keep up, and she's going to faint. Ah, she fainted.
- Angry man: Please be quiet.
- Kathy: Oh, give us a break. She doesn't see that well.
- Angry man: I paid good money to see this film.
- Kathy: Well, so did she.
- Selma: I love it when they dance.
- Angry man: For Pete's sake, it's a musical. Of course they're dancing!
- Kathy: We know that!
- Angry man: Oh, you're so smart.
- Kathy: Yes.
- Selma: I think you made friends, Kathy. [laughing]
- Selma: Would it make you feel better If I told you a secret?
- Bill: What secret could you tell me?
- Selma: I'm going blind. Not yet, but... soon. Maybe sometime this year.
- Bill: Blind...
- Selma: It's not as bad as it sounds. It's, uh... It's a family thing.
- Bill: But, blind?
- Selma: I've always known it. From... when I was a little girl, I knew.
- Bill: And you're okay?
- Selma: Well, I came to America because in America, they can give Gene an operation.
- Selma: You know when the camera goes really big and it comes up out of the roof, and you just know that it's gonna end? I hate that. I used to cheat on that when I was a little girl back in Czechoslovakia. I would leave the cinema just after the next to last song, and the film would just go on forever. It's lovely, isn't it?
- Bill: That is lovely.
- Jeff: Look, I don't understand. In musicals... why do they start to sing and dance all of a sudden? I mean, I don't suddenly start... to sing and dance.
- Selma: No... You're right, Jeff. You don't.
- Jeff: You can't see, can you?
- Selma: What is there to see?
- Brenda: Why don't you try to think of something nice, all right?
- Selma: It's just so quiet here.
- Brenda: What's that got to do with it, Selma?
- Selma: You know, when I used to work in the factory... I used to dream that I was in a musical... Because, in a musical, nothing dreadful ever happens.
- Kathy: But he needs his mother, you know, alive, no matter where!
- Selma: You don't understand! He needs his eyes!
- Kathy: He needs his mother!
- Selma: No!
- Kathy: Yes! Alive!
- Selma: NO!!
- Kathy: Listen to reason for once, Selma! Selma...
- Selma: I listen to my heart...
- Jeff: Why did you have him? You knew he would have the same disease as you.
- Selma: I just wanted to hold a little baby... just in my arms.
Taglines
[edit]- You don't need eyes to see.
- In a world of shadows, she found the light of life.
Cast
[edit]- Björk - Selma Ježková
- Catherine Deneuve - Kathy (Cvalda)
- Peter Stormare - Jeff
- David Morse - Bill Houston
- Cara Seymour - Linda Houston
- Vladica Kostic - Gene
- Joel Grey - Oldřich Nový
External links
[edit]
- Dancer in the Dark quotes at the Internet Movie Database