Dogville

The first film in what Lars Von Trier plans to be a trilogy about America has drawn numerous comparisons to Thornton Wilder for its treatment of small-town American life and bold, Brechtian staging. But the film doesn't so much call the playwright's beloved Our Town to mind as it does his screenplay for Alfred Hitchcock's SHADOW OF A DOUBT, particularly the moment when murderous Uncle Charlie explains to his wide-eyed niece that if you ripped the fronts from most American houses, you'd find swine. Von Trier's swine are the residents of Dogville, a tiny Depression-era Rocky Mountain township that offers reluctant refuge to Grace (Nicole Kidman), a mysterious fu...