Many American critics including Ebert & Roeper accused Dogville of being an anti-American movie because it seems to imply that America does not care for the weakest members of its society and worse, that they are exploited whenever people think they can get away with it. The images of poverty stricken Americans of different eras flashing over the screen during the closing credits, accompanied by the song "Young Americans" by David Bowie, overtly suggest that the film is indeed intended to be a comment on American society.[1]
I'd say two things to this. 1. Ebert and Roeper are absolutely right; and foolish if they are defending against this film's indictment. 2. This movie really pays off in the end; through the credits portrayal of America's poorest, David Bowie's song, and the searing violence lusted after for emotional relief.
This movie means a couple of things to me:
1. Its a certain indictment of a system that abandons its poor and exploits its vulnerable. This is certainly across the board, as the rich exploit the poor, the poor exploit the exploitable, and perhaps there is no justice.
2. However, Van Trier seems to be advocating a certain vigilante form of justice. As his protagonists admit that they are each arrogant, they decide however that punishment "in order to train dogs into usefulness" is apt in its full deservedness, when natural behavior acts unethically and unacceptably. This vigilante thesis argues that we must take justice into our own hands.
3. In a way, I feel this movie tries to ignite violent revolutionary reaction from its viewers. As we are forced to watch the protagonists suffering, and hate those who inflict it, we relish in the violent retribution as it materializes. We hope for violence and harsh punishment, and secretly applaud when children and adults alike, are murdered in vindictive cold blood as they shiver in fear. We like that no mercy is shown and we feel complete when this finale unfolds. From this, the director exploits our own human frailness as we are forced to understand one particular true expression of justice.
4. Another thing I feel he is trying to express or remind the audience is that no human is innocent : whether exploited or exploiting. That each human has to capacity to use another if the circumstances are just right; to truly exploit if there are to be no consequences. Although one attempts to alleviate suffering where it is most abundant, will those sufferers join in the massive campaign of exploitation as soon as they leave the role of exploitee? He seems to be reminding us that humans are shit, at each stop on the social ladder, and they don't get better as they climb. Perhaps they even are worse as they climb, as the former mistreated start to see the pleasure in mistreating; in claiming entitlement. Perhaps, but this is not guaranteed. We must keep in mind that to view this as justification for social Darwinism, or perhaps arrogantly condemning humanity and avoiding an social responsibility, is the wrong path to follow.
5. Instead, one might take an existential route. While attempting to alleviate suffering, only for the sake of diminishing suffering, one should not take into account whether the net gain of goodness will utilitarianistically increase. If the exploited turns into the exploiter one should not react in condemning the aid toward the exploited, calling it a futile or a unwinnable route. While this is perhaps an apt assumption - one must still fight suffering, for the sake of this act in itself. If justice is the most important thing in this world, then this is the only true justice - even as every other route is unpredicable, and perhaps inevitably plagued by human ethical frailty. Like modern Humanism, one must try to help without the promise of reward.
6. Finally, perhaps the director is trying to say : If we are all guilty, then we must accept our guilt as what it is, and crush the true evil. Is he advocating the classic mantra, "smash the state?" Perhaps. But even if the utopian result is an impossibility, if human society can only be destructive, Von Trier is advocating fighting back against a harsh exploiter, instead of turning the other cheek to be beaten like a helpless dog.
7. Mao says “Communism is not love. Communism is a hammer which we use to crush the enemy.” In this sense, if communism isn't the utopian Marxist vision of a loving community which helps itself as a whole, and each person to individual fulfillment, then perhaps the ideal within communism is pure unadulterated and just violence. Perhaps humanity or society (ie the state) deserves only the crushing fist, and love or tolerance solidifies the inevitable cycle of exploitation.
Quote from movie:
You want the curtains opened? You don't need them anymore. What do you think?
l think we should open them. l think it's appropriate.
This tells us : its time to pull back the veneer.
8. While I cannot advocate this point of view, as history has proven it catastrophic in civilian casualties and freedom's destruction, I cannot argue that this viewpoint has no ring to it. In many points of history where exploitation is explicit, and suffering is real, perhaps the only true justice comes in the hammer and not the heart. But, in the back corner of a pretentious existential mind, absurd notions of idealistic love still take prominence, and perhaps refuse to see the awful truth of this world, condemning justice once and for all.
9. As Kant suggests: "The right to hospitality, “the right to visit […] belongs to all men by virtue of their common ownership of the earth’s surface” (11) : or link
Some Quotes:
you should be merciful
When there is time to be merciful
But you must maintain
your own standard
You owe them that
The penalty you deserve for your transgressions...
they deserve for their transgressions.
- they are human beings
----
But dogs only obey their own nature
So why shouldn't we forgive them?
Dogs can be taught
many useful things
but not if we forgive them every time
they obey their own nature.
