Breaking The Waves

A thorny, disquieting fable set in a repressed, insular community on the desolately beautiful Scottish coast. Bess (Emily Watson) is a somewhat simple girl given to extravagant emotional outbursts that dismay her reserved family and neighbors, who nevertheless recognize her open hearted goodness and selfless devotion to God. She defies convention to marry Jan (Stellan Skarsgard), an oil-rig worker whom the locals regard with suspicion, as they do all outsiders. Jan awakens the sensual spirit that slumbers beneath Bess' strict Calvinist upbringing, and she loves him with an all-consuming passion. When he's paralyzed in an accident, she devotes herself to his care, a...