With his latest film, MELANCHOLIA, Lars Von Trier confirms his place as my favorite living director.  Every time I see one of his films, I feel as if I get him and he gets me.  Now he's a chronic depressive, afraid to fly, with a tendency to say the wrong thing at Cannes and elsewhere, so what does that really say about me?  Unusual worldview, maybe.

It doesn't matter whether you like him, hate him, or never heard of him, Lars has made what someone called the most beautiful film about the end of the world ever.  In his version, Kirsten Dunst is a depressed bride who although sunny and shining in the opening scene, quickly starts falling apart.  Her sister, played by Charlotte Gainsbourg, seems to be the one who rides to the rescue, the sane one...until everyone realizes that there seems to be a planet on a collision course with earth.  With Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, beautiful tragedy on the soundtrack, and pristine cinematography, it's hard to reconcile what you see with what you know is coming.  But most significantly, and this is what I love the most about Von Trier's work, you will not be able to stop thinking about it long after you have left the theater.