It was simply because we didn't have anything else to watch (that would meet Ian's approval) that evening, when I decided to look for Dogville. I was willing to watch it for quite a while actually, I wanted to refresh my memory and well... I think I also wanted to impress Ian with that film. Lars von Trier's work is my own speciality and his films are particularly representative to my taste in films and arts.
Before I start commenting on Dogville is worth of mentioning that I am one fo those people who love re-watching their favourite pieces. I find it as a form of rediscovery. It's something what Thomas Wolfe said: 'We are the sum of all the moments of our lives', everyone of us looks at the world through their own key-hole, approaching reality from the angle that is being set through our life experience. Now, if you apply Wolfe's quote to experiencing the arts, our level of understanding and interpreting it, will always depend on our life experience and knowledge. My own theory is then, that a film watched at the age of 14 won't be the same experience if you decide to watch it once again when you're 30 or again when you are going to be 65. What changes is your approach, which is based mostly on your ability of applying story to your own ethics, which are being crafted by your life experience. Things you haven't notice before might be discovered, as you don't look at the world through the same eyes.
The last time I watched Dogville was in 2001 ro maybe 2002. I was still in Poland, spending every Friday evening at our lovely Film Discussion Club (DKF), where I had chance to see the most of international high-class artistic cinema. I remember how exciting it was to see it for the first time, I walked out of the cinema complimenting absolutely everything about it - the concept, the story, acting and simplicity of aesthetics. None of it have changed when I watched the movie after 5 years. It was all there - von Trier's genius fully exposed. Yet the experience after all felt different to me. For several reasons.
For the first time I was able to see that none of the characters was actually positive. Of course Grace was the main character and certainly the most appealing, but surely far from the title of a heroine. Grace simply by being merciful and forgiving let people of Dogville make herself a slave and servant, humiliated and abused. Her father calls her 'the biggest arrogant he had ever known', because she doesn't judge people when they deserve to be judged, she doesn't condamn them when they do something wrong; all she does is blaming the circumstances. But there is more to people's actions than circumstances, everyone of us have a choice, if people are bad, it's only because they choose to be that way. I know, I'm simplifying the issue, but so does Lars in a way. Grace finally asks herself a question, is the people's best, fairly good enough?
I always regarded Grace as someone pure and innocent, but it occured to me that she wasn't like that at all. It was her own choice to have herslef treated the way she was. She's nothing better than people of Dogville - she decides to be a part of the system of violence and injustice by deciding to play the part of a victim. I know it all sounds very peculiar, but that description certainly applys to the situation presented in von Trier's film.
The other thing I experienced differently when rewatching Dogville was out of the fact of moving to England and becoming more fluent in english. All the characters seemed much clearer to me now, their actions had different reasoning than I thought they did. Believe me or not, but Tom seemed much nicer and smarter with polish subtitles than he was without the translator's help lol! I also became much more appreciative towards von Trier's skills to write such excellent scrip in foreing language, not many writers/directors could pull the trigger the way he did.
All in all, Dogville is a fenomenal experience and my main goal has been achieved - Ian loved the movie!