{"id":272578,"date":"2025-10-02T18:55:15","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T18:55:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/272578\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T18:55:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T18:55:15","slug":"joachim-trier-on-sentimental-value-begging-stellan-skarsgard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/272578\/","title":{"rendered":"Joachim Trier on Sentimental Value & Begging Stellan Skarsgard"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sitting down with a director for the first time is one of my favorite things. It\u2019s a get-to-know-you session, even if it\u2019s just a half hour in the lobby of New York\u2019s Ritz-Carlton Hotel. I\u2019m meeting Norway\u2019s Joachim Trier<\/a>, the fast-talking Cannes Grand Prix winner of \u201cSentimental Value\u201d<\/a> (Neon<\/a>, November 7), who co-wrote his sixth feature with his long-time collaborator Eskil Vogt, his fellow \u201cWorst Person in the World\u201d Best Original Screenplay Oscar nominee. The Academy also nominated that film<\/a> for Best International Feature Film. And given its warm reception so far from critics and audiences, Norwegian Oscar entry \u201cSentimental Value<\/a>\u201d is likely to nab even more nominations this Oscar season.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Mark<\/a> \"KILL<\/a> <\/p>\n

Trier took me on a wild ride through his film family and filmmaking philosophy and process, which includes \u201cjazz takes.\u201d (More on that later.) With \u201cSentimental Value,\u201d two decades of digging into the human and artistic psyche has yielded his most universal film, which tracks generational trauma within a show business family. After winning the Grand Prix at Cannes and turning away eager passholders in Telluride, \u201cSentimental Value\u201d has gone on to wow theater audiences in France and Norway, and this week, the New York Film Festival. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s partly because Trier successfully wooed Norway\u2019s Renate Reinsve<\/a> to return to his ensemble to play Nora Borg, a revered stage actress, as well as Swedish star Stellan Skarsg\u00e5rd<\/a>, who plays her father, Gustav, a once-successful auteur now in decline who tries to persuade his daughter to make a movie with him. He desperately wants to mend broken bridges, but she isn\u2019t having it, and he moves on to an American star (Elle Fanning), even though she\u2019s a bad fit for the role.<\/p>\n

Both Reinsve and Skarsg\u00e5rd give towering performances that will not be denied at Oscar time (for Best Actress and Supporting Actor, respectively), given that Neon, which bought the film at Cannes 2024 before production, is adept at playing the\u00a0awards game<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The following interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length. <\/p>\n

Anne Thompson: Your film is hitting universal chords. How many of us have been traumatized by our parents?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Joachim Trier: <\/strong>It\u2019s the nature of human beings almost.<\/p>\n

This film is informed by your own culturally rich background. <\/strong><\/p>\n

I come from a film family. My grandfather, Erik L\u00f8chen, a film director, was in Cannes in 1960. And he created art. I knew him as a child. He passed away when I was nine. He was in the resistance during the Second World War and was captured and spent time in a work camp and barely survived. He was affected by it his whole life, but started playing jazz and making movies. \u201cThe Hunt,\u201d his first film, he called the \u201cjazz movie.\u201d And the French called it \u201cNouvelle Vague.\u201d I believe that art can have a saving power. It\u2019s not something done just for purpose. It\u2019s something you do because you don\u2019t know how not to. I see it in my children as well. They dance and sing, and they\u2019re very small: \u201cSo this is what humans do, okay?\u201d<\/p>\n

But also humans become obsessed and chase achievement and ignore children. <\/strong><\/p>\n

I have two daughters, one and a half and four and a half years old. I had children late. I\u2019ve pondered upon how obsessed I am by making movies, and would I be able to create a home? I was ready, in a way, and I\u2019m making a film about that as well. I believe in that balance and possibility. That came out of that climate of being in middle age, still having parents, having small children. You have a feeling that things move fast, and maybe not wanting to be Stellan\u2019s character, who is complicated and egocentric.<\/p>\n

\"JoachimJoachim Trier, Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsg\u00e5rd, and Elle Fanning pose during the \u2018Sentimental Value\u2019 photocall at CannesGetty Images<\/p>\n

When he pitches Nora to star in his movie, it doesn\u2019t land well. <\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s his only way of trying to connect. If you look at it from her point of view, she\u2019s grieving her mother, and she needs a father, and he\u2019s offering her a job. But if you look closely, it\u2019s a clumsy man without a language and emotionality that\u2019s trying desperately to connect with the daughter that he loves. So that\u2019s the sadness of it. I\u2019m trying to straddle or balance these two energies of different perspectives. <\/p>\n

Throughout the film, Skarsg\u00e5rd is operating on many levels, saying one thing while his face says something else. <\/strong><\/p>\n

I wrote this film for two actors. It\u2019s Renate Reinsve and Skarsgard. I never worked with him before. I didn\u2019t even know him. I contacted him during the writing process and flew to Sweden. And I\u2019ve never begged an actor before, but the more I hung out with him, the more I realized I couldn\u2019t do without him. He\u2019s one of the really, really great, great actors of the Scandinavian countries and the world, to be honest. I\u2019m super proud that he\u2019s accepted. He\u2019s tender and sweet, but he also knows how to not idealize characters. He can be a real asshole on screen, and he can play a narcissist. He knows who that is. He understands people in an intimate, intricate way, psychologically. He\u2019s sophisticated like that. I call him Mr. Cinema because he\u2019s worked with everyone internationally.<\/p>\n

Everyone, every kind of film, big or small, every visual medium<\/strong>, from Lars von Trier <\/a>to \u201cAndor\u201d and \u201cDune.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

And he loves movies like me. He watches movies. He eats movies for breakfast. He comes on set more than any other actor I\u2019ve worked with. He doesn\u2019t want to be away in his trailer in the morning. I have my whole method of talking to the team, prepping them emotionally for what we\u2019re going through, how they can help me, help the actors, they\u2019re co-directors. I say, \u201cwe\u2019re changing wheels on the Formula One car.\u201d When the actors are out, we\u2019re moving fast. And Stellan comes and he sits next to me: \u201cYeah, what do you want to do?\u201d He will understand movements. \u201cOkay, so I should get up a little later than this.\u201d \u201cGreat idea. Yeah, please. That\u2019s smart Stellan. Mr. Cinema.\u201d He has all that craft. But in this one, he wanted to go out on a limb, and he wanted to lose control, which is the kind of movie I do. I try to create an unhinged chaotic state just in the moment of shooting. We plan a lot. We have rehearsals. We trust each other, but to give them a risk, a chance for something special. And he wanted that.<\/p>\n

\"SENTIMENTAL\u2018Sentimental Value\u2019Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

What did you see that Renate could do here, that you hadn\u2019t let her do before?<\/strong><\/p>\n

She is an actor that brings unexpectedness, mystery and hard, precise work. So that combo is exciting. After \u201cThe Worst Person,\u201d I felt we had known each other, but the way she opened up in that role, I saw potential. She was quite naive in playing a young character in \u201cThe Worst Person,\u201d whereas Nora carries a burden of a trajectory that\u2019s fixed. She\u2019s as ambitious as Nora, she\u2019s quite opposite of Julie in the previous film. I saw that aspect of Renate. I knew she would understand. And we share that. We\u2019ve both been that person, in a way, in a different version in our lives, but someone who\u2019s so driven and it gives you a sense of life and connectedness, and it also could be a coping mechanism of avoidance as well as communication in itself. It\u2019s both.<\/p>\n

One dramatic and comedic set piece is at the beginning, when Nora freaks out with intense stage fright before opening night of August Strindberg\u2019s play\u00a0\u201cMiss Julie,\u201d in which she is the lead. She\u2019s busting out of her corset, unable to breathe. Where did that come from?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I know two actors in Norway, great stage actors, who have stage fright like crazy. One of them, it becomes more physical, and he vomits a lot during the whole stage performance of \u201cHamlet.\u201d We all have our performance anxieties, right? That\u2019s a part of creating. And then I know a woman who kept trying to run away. And I wanted to have levity as well, not to be too self-serious about the artists. But it\u2019s a human thing that we have approach and avoidance at the same time with things that we care for that we\u2019re also scared of, because they dominate us. Renate does not suffer from stage fright. She\u2019s actually bold and gutsy, but she knows that there\u2019s a perversion going on stage in an almost evolutionary, animalistic way. To be in front of everyone\u2019s gaze is the most dangerous place for any being in the animal kingdom. You\u2019re extremely vulnerable, and you\u2019re in a masochistic sense exposing yourself. <\/p>\n

I have deep respect and love for actors on the film set. They keep their heart open and their emotions open for 8-10, hours, emotions that the rest of us would put away after 10 minutes. We would finish crying and say, \u201cAh, I don\u2019t want to feel that anymore.\u201d They keep it open. So I thought, behind all the beauty or facade of a success, there\u2019s also that vulnerability of the gaffer tape dress that is broken and it\u2019s all just made up by a great bunch of people. It\u2019s my love letter to the gang that makes something. It\u2019s messy and beautiful at its best, and we\u2019re all just trying to talk about something because we don\u2019t know how not to, but also to try to generously share it with people, not to say, \u201cOh, you have to be an artist, understand my movie.\u201d Rather the opposite, saying, \u201cHey, these are messy people and in the story, I\u2019m trying to create the idea that the communication of art is a key to open a family story to a deeper level.\u201d That\u2019s what I\u2019m trying.<\/p>\n

Finally, that does happen. It\u2019s reconciliation? <\/strong><\/p>\n

It works, right? Reconciliation. That\u2019s the word, and not the cheap kind where you say, \u201cWell, you\u2019ll have that dialogue, and they will share their feelings, and everything is okay.\u201d I don\u2019t believe that\u2019s life. I believe that maybe there is a distance. Reconciliation isn\u2019t that we have to agree or have to get acceptance for everything, but that we will negotiate enough our differences that we can listen to the other and say, \u201cWe might not ever agree, but I can find peace with you.\u201d And that\u2019s what I\u2019m longing for, on many levels. <\/p>\n

So you\u2019ve experienced psychotherapy?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve had that experience. Yes, I\u2019ve been fortunate enough to to learn that there are certain things maybe that you have to also deal with, yourself, to accept that not all relationships can be resolved objectively. <\/p>\n

Do you believe that if you don\u2019t learn the language of psychotherapy you will never understand yourself? <\/strong><\/p>\n

The aim of certain psychodynamic therapy is to go beyond the language, to reach an emotional presence in yourself. There is some aspect of human life which is language without words. I believe that in trauma and woundedness, there is unspokenness we transfer to our children, tons of things without language that we don\u2019t control. This is how humans grow and develop and connect or disconnect. We know this to be true in our emotional experience, all of us. And isn\u2019t that non-spoken space connected to the possibility of art, the possibility of how music moves us, or how we mirror ourselves in a movie, and all our friends don\u2019t like it, but we feel deeply moved, and we don\u2019t know how to defend it, but we know it\u2019s true to us? Yes, that space exists in art.<\/p>\n

What are \u201cjazz takes\u201d? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Anders Danielsen Lie, my dear collaborator, he\u2019s a musician as well. He said, \u201cwhat you\u2019re asking for towards the end of doing a scene, let\u2019s call it a \u2018jazz take.’\u201d It\u2019s perfect, because you know the structure, you know the tune. But let\u2019s phrase it differently. Let\u2019s play it your way, different. The loose take encourages the actors to continually search and fall on their ass. It\u2019s the \u201chang loose\u201d concept. Let\u2019s see where it goes. They know that I\u2019m next to the camera, and they want to do something unexpected. They find it. And I sit there and I cry and I laugh and I love them. That\u2019s my job, to encourage the risk of making it look stupid, but then at the end it comes back.<\/p>\n

One of the film\u2019s great set pieces is a moving breakthrough between the two sisters, played by Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas. It was not scripted? <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Sentimental\u2018Sentimental Value\u2019Neon<\/p>\n

It happens in the moment completely. It\u2019s written in one way, and everyone was in love with the written version. But on the day, we try to create an event, something that we didn\u2019t quite plan. Inga, the young sister, she didn\u2019t share with me her trajectory. It turned out that the film for her was about love and the power of it. She shows the way that she wants to get close to her depressed sister. And it was more moving in the story. It was like she was in control, and she opened up the sister\u2019s emotional register. She\u2019s actually bringing her own grief, this connectedness into the scene. <\/p>\n

Is Eskil Vogt on set? <\/strong><\/p>\n

No. Never. During filming we don\u2019t talk so much. We do our talking before; we write together every day, and then he writes out the script. He\u2019s a better writer than me, so out of the year, maybe six weeks is spent apart at the end, when he writes and I edit and we meet and he writes again, and we do the actual writing. But we planned everything, we talked everything, we acted everything, and then I do rehearsals. So rehearsals is just about trying the elasticity with the actors. He\u2019s not there, and I show him the tapes. So he has that remote position. And then we rewrite. Then I go on set, and he leaves me alone until the second half of the edit, when I have something I want to show. <\/p>\n

Does he come into the editing room?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I do screenings with him and others and discuss. An important person I\u2019ve worked with since day one is Olivier Bugge Coutt\u00e9, the editor. Editors don\u2019t get enough respect. It\u2019s this triangle before and after. It\u2019s Eskil and Olivier and me. Eskil comes in and reminds us of things, and sees things, and that\u2019s important. But Olivier runs the room. He sees what we have. There\u2019s a dialectic between these two very smart collaborators. And then in the middle, we have beautiful Kasper Tuxen, the cinematographer, and the actors, who bring their own things. It\u2019s a complete collaboration. <\/p>\n

It seems that this movie is reaching people, they\u2019re understanding what you\u2019re talking about. They get it.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m happy we\u2019re doing great box office in France and Norway now, the two countries that have opened are tremendous. In France, after three weeks, we sold over 400,000 tickets and it\u2019s still going. And in Norway, the same thing, we\u2019re doubling the numbers from the previous one at least, if not more. So how the hell did that happen when cinematic box office is diminished generally? <\/p>\n

Who did you use for the narration? <\/strong><\/p>\n

That is Benter B\u00f8rsum, who\u2019s now 93 years old, and who played the lead in my grandfather\u2019s film \u201cThe Hunt\u201d that was in Cannes in 1960. \u201cDo you want to come and do a voiceover so that I link this experience of this film I\u2019ve worked on with someone that my grandfather also worked with?\u201d And she said, \u201cOf course, I\u2019d love to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neon will open \u201cSentimental Value\u201d in theaters on Friday, November 7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sitting down with a director for the first time is one of my favorite things. It\u2019s a get-to-know-you…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":272579,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[5800,171,2104,1020,1149,112721,53,15801,25784,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-272578","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-awards","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-festivals","11":"tag-film","12":"tag-interviews","13":"tag-joachim-trier","14":"tag-movies","15":"tag-oscars","16":"tag-sentimental-value","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-unitedstates","19":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115306098041897131","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272578"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272578\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272579"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}