The Postironical
Table of contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................3
Mission.......................................................................................................................................4
Method.......................................................................................................................................4
Theory........................................................................................................................................5
What is irony?.........................................................................................................................5
Recognizing irony...................................................................................................................8
Purpose of irony......................................................................................................................9
Irony in visual arts.................................................................................................................10
Basis of movement................................................................................................................11
Postmodern thinking.............................................................................................................13
The Postironical......................................................................................................................16
Characteristics of the Postironical literature.........................................................................17
Revolt against the System.....................................................................................................19
Understanding the Postironical.............................................................................................20
Theory conclusion.................................................................................................................23
Analysis....................................................................................................................................23
Epidemic’s narrative structure..............................................................................................25
Motivation and narration.......................................................................................................27
Ironic distance.......................................................................................................................28
Rules and commitment..........................................................................................................29
Epidemic’s stylistic structure................................................................................................32
Metafiction............................................................................................................................32
A Postmodern film................................................................................................................33
The ending scene...................................................................................................................35
The ironic interpretation........................................................................................................37
Conclusion of Epidemic........................................................................................................38
Breaking the Waves................................................................................................................40
Narrative structure.................................................................................................................40
A melodramatic story............................................................................................................41
Stylistic structure and display of similarities........................................................................43
A self-conscious double strategy...........................................................................................45
The last scene........................................................................................................................47
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The Postironical
Key findings..........................................................................................................................48
Comparison.............................................................................................................................48
Perspective of Andersen’s theory..........................................................................................49
Conclusion...............................................................................................................................53
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The Postironical
Introduction
We see it when we turn on the TV, when we look at advertising billboards, we use it in
conversation and we experience it almost every day; I am talking about irony. The reason I
have chosen this particular subject is due to the seemingly increased practice of irony that
subsists within Western culture. It is something we use on a daily basis for more or less
comedic effect. It is an interesting device we use when we communicate with each other
because at its design, we are saying or doing something, which is the exact opposite of what
we mean and as such this would seemingly hinder the message. In order to avoid this, irony
has to be used as a community of language and mutual understanding. However, this aspect
has made me speculate the significance of irony – and to what purpose it serves. Literature of
the 1960s and 70s used irony as a critical tool against the establishment, but recent
postmodern literature of the 90s shows how irony has become less than that. This is argued by
the American author David Foster Wallace, who furthermore states that postmodern irony of
the sixties functioned as a healthy reaction against the System and a way of unmasking the
conservative establishment. However, during the eighties and nineties the System changed,
which also affected irony as a counter-cultural language. This meant that mainstream culture
took over irony and has now become a norm in itself – thus rendering irony without critical
value. Within this, the focus on irony becomes apparent and therefore also an important
subject of this thesis. Moreover, this reckoning with irony has also inspired a whole new
movement within contemporary culture called The Postironical, which has been coined by
Danish university professor Tore Rye Andersen, who sees that several tendencies in American
literature point toward a common name. However, Andersen also argues that describing The
Postironical as a genuine avant-garde would be premature and only time will tell the
outcome. As such this thesis is not an attempt to establish Andersen’s theory a new
movement, but rather an employment of its practice. On the basis of this, the most interesting
aspect of the Postironical is Andersen’s statement concerning Danish film director Lars von
Trier, who he notes to demonstrate characteristics of the theory discussed.
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The Postironical
Mission
At its point of departure, this thesis seeks to examine the concept of irony as a preliminary
tool in order to analyze Andersen’s notion of the Postironical. The main focus of the analysis
will examine the Danish film director Lars von Trier, who Andersen claims to exhibit strong
Postironical traits. In order to do so I will to look at two of Trier’s film Epidemic and
Breaking the Waves, which both contain ironic aspects.
Method
In order to examine to the theory of the Postironical, I will apply Danish University professor
Tore Rye Andersen’s argument on this subject in his essay Down With The Rebels! – David
Foster Wallace and Postironical Literature (2005), where he theorizes on irony within
literature as well as in film. The first part of the thesis will examine the concept and definition
of irony, which will function as a basis to analyze the subject at hand. As mentioned above
this thesis concentrates on the Postironical and as such I find it relevant to examine the
concept which dominates the argued movement namely irony. In order to do so, I will look at
Paul De Man’s theory on irony in Aesthetic Ideology (1996), in which he attempts to give a
definition hereof. Furthermore, I will incorporate the theory of Wayne Booth in A Rhetoric of
Irony (1974) will be taken into account due to his practical criticism of the concept. the
Canadian university professor Linda Hutcheon’s Irony’s Edge – The theory and politics of
irony (1994), will also be considered, given that she theorizes on the practical use of irony in
everyday language and in particular the reason as to why we use it. In the theory section I will
also include an inspection of Modernism as well as Postmodernism, noted by university
professor Michael Rasmussen, which are the movements leading up to the notion of the
Postironical. As the theory of the Postironical is mainly based on literature, I also find it
necessary to include Lars Elleström who in Divine Madness (2002) theorizes on irony in
visual arts, as my analysis concentrates on film. The analysis will then focus on the two films
mentioned above, which will be done through a comparative Neoformalistic analysis on the
basis of Analyse af billedmedier (2006) by Gitte Rose and H.C. Christiansen. The analysis
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will also include Torben Grodal’s Filmoplevelse (2003) who is a professor in film science and
theorizes on viewer-perception in film. Along with this, the characteristics of Andersen’s
theory on the Postironical will be taking into account in order to establish or deny Lars von
Trier as en Postironist. Lastly, I will draw a perspective of Andersen’s theory where his
statements concerning the Postironical will be discussed with reference to Hutcheon and
university professor Claire Colebrook who in Irony (2004) explores a critique of Postmodern
irony.
Theory
What is irony?
Language device, either in spoken or written form in which the real meaning is concealed or contradicted by the literal meanings of the words (verbal irony) or in a situation in which there is an incongruity between what is expected and what occurs (dramatic irony).1
However, according to Paul de Man irony is extremely difficult to define. De Man writes in
Aesthetic Ideology that Søren Kierkegaard’s book The Concept of Irony (1841) is an ironic
title because irony is not a concept, and as such it would be impossible to give a definition of
irony. At his point of departure, De Man refers to German Romanticism in the early part of
the nineteenth century, as the important period on the theorization of irony. Furthermore, De
Man examines irony from a deconstructive point of view which can be seen by the following.
By looking at the different theorists and philosophers of that period, De Man states that even
they seem to disagree on the concept of irony. The German aesthetician Karl Wilhelm
Ferdinand Solger, who writes perceptively about irony in Erwin, Vier Gespräche über das
Schöne und die Kunst (1815), complains that the poet August Wilhelm Schlegel, although he
writes about irony, he cannot define it. Later on, the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
Hegel, who also writes about irony in Lectures on Aesthetics (1835), complains that Solger
does not seem to know what he is writing about. Finally, when Søren Kierkegaard writes
about the “concept of irony”, he complains that Hegel does not seem to know what irony is.
The problem, De Man faces, is that he sees irony to encompass all tropes, but at the same time
very difficult to define as a trope. If one was to look at the meaning of the word ‘trope’ which
1 "irony." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica, 2010
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means “to turn”, it would be possible to define irony as a trope according to literary theorist
Northrop Frye who defines irony as “a pattern of words that turns away from direct statement
or its own obvious meaning”2. As such one can only agree with this definition, but while
‘meaning one thing and saying something else’ or ‘praise by blame’ might be considered
traditional definitions of irony, De Man still feels that this turning away in irony involves a
more radical negation than one would have in an ordinary trope, such as metaphor or
metonymy.
The argument above is also supported by English professor Linda Hutcheon, who in Irony’s
Edge (1994) on the communicative concept of irony, states that irony will mean different
things to ‘players’. She notes that irony should be seen from the point of view of the
interpreter, and therefore becomes an interpretive and intentional move,
it is the making or inferring of meaning in addition to and different what is stated, together with an attitude toward both the said and the unsaid. The move is usually triggered (and then directed) by conflictual textual or contextual evidence or by markers which are socially agreed upon.3
As such irony involves more than simple contradiction and a general consensus among the
many theorists of irony only seems to be the notion of irony involving something unsaid. An
example of this is stated by Hutcheon who sees how difficult all the parts of a more complex
ironic utterance can by logically contradictory. In this aspect Hutcheon argues how a
seemingly straightforward utterance such as “I love people who signal” made by a driver in
city traffic who has just been cut off by a driver who did not signal. In context, this is irony
but the statement is also literally true and furthermore so is its opposite, “I hate people who do
not signal” however, such a decoding would involve inverting both parts of a relatively
simple sentence. With this Hutcheon argues that no theory of irony as simple logical
contradiction on the level of the word would be able to explain how you would know the
difference and choose between “I love people who signal” or “I hate people who signal”, on
the one hand, and “I hate people who do not signal”, on the other.4
Returning to De Man who goes on to say that irony also has a performative function because
it consoles, it promises and excuses, which seems to fall out of the tropological field but at the 2 De Man, Paul. Aesthetic Ideology (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press 1996) p 1643 Hutcheon, Linda. Irony’s Edge (1994) p 114 Hutcheon. p 62
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same time is very closely connected with it. So again, it becomes very difficult if not
impossible to get to a conceptualization by means of definition. Consequently, De Man’s take
on irony becomes deconstructive and this is substantiated through his notion of describing
irony as a “permanent parabasis”5, a fundamentally uncontrollable figure which destabilizes
literature’s internal structures of signification and reduces the meaning of widely different
literary works to the same skeptical relativization of the chances of communication. In this
perspective, a text is either ironical or earnest, and a division into a playful postmodernism
and a serious realism is a natural consequence hereof. It is perhaps better to look at irony from
a different approach, which is also mentioned by De Man who briefly takes on the issue by
studying Wayne Booth’s A Rhetoric of Irony.6 The approach made by Booth is possibly more
sensible than De Man’s because he starts out from a question in practical criticism and does
not get involved in definitions or tropes. He gives the question,
Is it ironic? How do I know that the text with which I am confronted is going to be ironic or is it not going to be ironic? It’s very important to know that: lots of discussions turn around this and one always feels terrible when one has read a text and one it told later on that it’s ironic. It is a very genuine question-whatever you have to do, it would indeed be very helpful and very desirable to know: by what markers, by what devices, by what indications or signals in the text we can decide that a text is ironic or is not?7
However, when using Booth’s notion on irony one must assume we know what irony is in
order to pose the aforementioned question. And for now let us believe that we have a general
idea of what that is even though the concept of irony still seems impossible to define. To put
it simply and perhaps foolhardily; irony is saying one thing and meaning another, and as such
this aspect becomes what Wayne Booth calls stable irony8 because this type requires a
complex verbal reconstruction. According to Booth there are four steps of reconstructing
stable irony which I now will briefly go through. Step one: The reader is required to reject the
literary meaning; however it is not enough that the reader rejects the meaning because he or
she disagrees nor is it enough that the reader should add meaning. As such the reader should
be able to recognize some incongruity among the words or between the words and something
he or she knows. The second step concentrates on alternative interpretations or explanations
which are tried out by the reader. In this situation we go through possible alternative
5 De Man, Paul. p 1796 Booth, Wayne. A Rhetoric of Irony (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974) 7 De Man. p 165 8 Booth. p 9
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explanations and accept these but only when other plausible ones fail to emerge or satisfy us.
When this is done we come to step three, where we must make a decision about the author’s
knowledge or beliefs. It is at this point that we can begin to determine whether or not the
statement is ironic because I must determine that what I reject is also rejected by the author
and whether he or she has reason to expect my concurrence. Finally, in step four we can
choose a new meaning with which we can rest secure based on the previous three steps. We
have now established the process of reconstructing an ironic statement, the main issue now is
what I mentioned earlier namely how do we know when an author or speaker is being ironic?
Recognizing irony
Booth’s Four Steps of Reconstruction notes in the first step that the reader is required to reject
the literary meaning of the statement, but before we can make such a rejection, one must be
able to determine whether the author is trying to be ironic – how do we recognize that we
should even begin a reconstruction? According to Booth, there are clues in texts that can help
the reader to recognize irony. In spoken or verbal ironies, especially in conversations, we are
accustomed to catching a number of clues that are not in themselves ironic such as direct
nudges of the elbow and winks of the eye. The same kind of nudges can be found in written
irony, where the author provides clues of ironic meaning. Booth gives a variety clues intended
by authors of various literary works. I will not go through all of them but merely mention
some in order to construct a general perception of his theory. As mentioned, clues of irony are
often provided by the author’s own voice, which can sometimes be seen in titles, where the
author will use a direct epithet in his or her title to describe one of the qualities of his speaker.
Booth uses examples of Thomas Mann’s Felix Krull, Confidence Man (1954) and The Hollow
Men (1925) by T.S. Eliot. These titles give us direct information that we can use in suspecting
‘secret’ intentions behind the narrator’s words. Furthermore, some authors use epigraphs as
clues to ironic intentions which again serve as direct notion of the author’s objective and as
such provide the reader to recognize ironic meanings. Booth mentions other clues such as
deliberate errors where the speaker betrays ignorance that is simply incredible, which leads to
the belief that the author, in contrast, knows what he is doing. After going through Booth’s
notion on ironic clues in literature, it becomes clear that such clues are indeed needed in order
to identify an author’s intentions and thereby understand an ironic work. Without these
nudges it would seemingly be difficult if not impossible to recognize irony. Through the
examination of Booth’s theory on irony, it becomes apparent that he employs a more
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rhetorical and pragmatic perspective and as such irony can be perceived as a local and
temporary effect that communicates a specific message and does not necessarily destabilize
the whole work. Furthermore, Booth’s focus on the communicative aspects of irony provides
a number of interpretational tools that can register the many degrees of the concept of irony
and subsequently improving its analytical value.
Purpose of irony
If we from the section above presume to have knowledge of what irony is and how to
recognize it, one important question remains concerning irony. What is the purpose of using
irony? As mentioned in the introduction, irony surrounds our everyday life and it is practiced
by us and others and the mainstream culture of television. Therefore it seems appropriate to
ask why we employ this rhetoric language device in Western culture. However, it should be
noted that irony comes in different types and shows that this device is not always an
intentional move made by an ‘author’. Irony of fate, cosmic irony and irony of event fall under
the category of non-verbal ironies and are unintentional (at least as an atheist I choose to
believe so). They can be described as the discrepancy between the expected result and the
actual result of a situation where no ‘author’ is to blame. As such I choose, for the purpose of
the subject at hand, to ignore these types since the matter of the Postironical relies on the
intentional practice of irony. Returning to the question of the purpose of knowledge, one
might find some indication of the aspect when examining Booth’s theory on the four steps of
reconstruction, where the intention seems to signify a social gesture. Booth’s example “It’s
raining” can be used to show what I am talking about. If his friend were to say “lovely
weather we’re having today”, when it is pouring rain, it is meant to be ironic when it is
obvious to them both that it is not a lovely weather. Of course, there is the possibility that his
friend actually likes the rain but through the process of reconstructing his statement, this
alternative is discarded since the opposite seems more plausible. As such the ironic statement
becomes a friendly gesture because it is assumed by the ‘author’ that Booth knows what he
actually means. And this translates into a presumed acknowledgement of Booth’s
understanding, which compliments his intellect without trying to establish it prior to the
statement. It is apparent that this aspect does not represent the entire answer to the question of
the purpose of irony, but it shows the notion of one way irony can be used as social behavior.
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Irony in visual arts
As mentioned in the introduction I seek to employ the characteristics of Post(irony) from
literature into film, but as you may have observed the theory so far has mainly been dealing
with the focus on irony in written form namely literature. According to the Swedish university
Professor Lars Elleström in Devine Madness (2002), film would be a field where one might
expect to find rather developed theories on the study of irony. However, this is not the case
according the Elleström, who believes that although the extent of word irony in film discourse
is very high, the concept is almost never theoretically scrutinized. As such Elleström uses a
part of his book to criticize theorists on the subject of irony in film, which he claims are too
limited in their view of filmic irony. However, Elleström does note some aspects that I find
relevant in connection to this thesis. Firstly, Elleström claims that irony in film may certainly
be equivalent to irony in reality to which I agree.
Like the world around one, a film is presented via speech, visual and aural elements, characters, actions, and situations. To write about irony in film may be simply a variation of making ironic interpretations of more or less ordinary lives that the viewers live.9
As such one could argue that clues to irony, as discussed earlier, may be easier to locate in
film as supposed to literature, because the “nudges” represented in film are visual and not
written. I will briefly return to Booth concerning this issue. Booth gives an example of the
complexity of interpreting irony in written form. If a friend comes into the room and says “it’s
raining”, one’s inferences about his intentions are ordinarily quick and automatic. But to
accept his statement as a plain and simple effort to give information is highly complex and
depends on a elaborate context of linguistic and social assumptions, as well as assumptions
about his character and our relationship. This is seen as soon as we note in any part of his
statement or in its context any element that challenges the simplest literal interpretation.
Suppose he comes into the room dripping wet, stands for a moment looking dejected, and then
mourns, “It’s raining”. It suddenly becomes clear that he is no longer just giving information,
because we already have that information by looking at him. An important point here is made
by Booth,
9 Elleström, Lars. Divine Madness – On Interpreting Literatyre, Music and the Visual Arts Ironically (Lewisburg: Bucknell University, 2002) p 148
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But the precise content of his statement will not be clear to anyone reading my account here, because the three words “looking dejected” and “mourns” cannot tell enough about his character and our situation to show whether he is joking with a playful mournful tone or speaking from a mood of black despair.10
Furthermore, the statement can have other interpretations based on the listener’s knowledge
about what kind of statements the speaker is accustomed to make or knowledge of a quarrel
they had just had or by information about the speaker’s rheumatism – in fact by any of
innumerable contextual modifications which are brought to consciousness only when
challenged. For that reason, “it is more obviously clear that elaborate inferences are always
required when reading literature.”11 This aspect brings us back to the issue of irony in film,
because if in a movie or play, a character comes in dripping wet and says ”It’s raining”, the
author may well want us to think about what it means to say something so obvious as all that.
It may suggest, as Booth puts it, “literal-mindedness12”, or even stupidity. However, the
viewer’s interpretation becomes clear if the character speaks in an ironic tone and perhaps
after the other character looks at him standing there, dripping, for about thirty seconds. So, in
literature as in life, “it’s raining” can mean an unlimited number of things depending on the
context. Based on the aforementioned aspect one might argue that detecting irony in film is
less demanding than in literature.
Basis of movement
In order to understand Andersen’s notion of the Postironical, one must examine the basis of
its motivation. Just like any other movement such as Romanticism and Modernism it is
important to consider how they came to surface. As mentioned by Andersen, the postironical
does not represent a clean break with postmodernism, but rather a revised continuation or an
extension of it, which means the postironical is to a large degree related to postmodernism as
well as postmodernism is related to modernism. The interesting aspect here is the basis of this
supposed new ‘movement’, and in order to study this, one must look at the rise of earlier
movements.
It becomes evident that the rise of a certain movement is inevitably tied to social and cultural
beliefs or skepticism of society. It is often philosophers and theorists who question the
10 Booth. p 811 Booth. p 812 Booth. p 8
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cultural state of the society they live in. It would be redundant to go through every movement,
so for the purpose of the issue at hand, I will be looking at the movements leading up to
Andersen’s notion of the postironical. As mentioned earlier the Postironical can be seen as an
extension of postmodernism, so it would be reasonable to begin with the notion of that.
However, one must travel even further back because postmodernism is related to modernism.
It becomes apparent when dealing with movements that the exact time of their arrival is
somewhat difficult to determine thus they are often set within one half of a century.
Furthermore, some movements are still under debate as for their emergence. For the purpose
of Modernism I have chosen to place its entrance post World War II in the years between
1945 and 1980 – granted the basis of Modernism seems to be noted as early as the late
nineteenth century. The reason I have chosen a different time period is due to the relation to
postmodernism, because this ‘second generation’ of Modernism fueled the rise of
postmodernism.
Returning to the subject at hand, Modernism became a critical tool against the Enlightenment
thinking and as such it challenged or even rejected the thought of rationality and coherence of
Enlightenment thinking, art and music. The basis of this new movement became the result of
a fundamental theme that seemed to dominate the twentieth century, namely that of violence.
According to the Michael Rasmussen in the book “Fornuften og synerne”13 (2000), violence
became the main concern of the century and included violence between nations, between
groups, between individuals and even the violence the individual exerts on itself. This
prompted a central problem; how to regulate the violence. Furthermore, this affected the
philosophy of the time and challenged the basis of thinking and the ideals of Western society.
According to Rasmussen, “En måde at øve selvkritik på er at tematisere det man gør, idet man
bruger sin fornuft, former og anvender begreber, identificerer ting med andre ting og ikke
mindst abstraherer.”14 As such, this way of thinking reflects the tendency of the nineteenth
century where the way of thinking became subject to one’s actions and self-consciousness
was criticized. Also, this issue is seen as an expression of the crisis of philosophy because
philosophy has always along with science, been a conceptional cognition of reality – that
philosophy has always existed within the real, but has now resulted in human and collective
catastrophes. As a consequence, people longed for a new and different way of thinking which
exceeded reality seeing that the old way of thinking resulted in ruins. To explain the motives,
Rasmussen uses a literary work by Albert Camus called The Fall from 1956, which is a story 13 Rasmussen, Michael. Fornuften og Synerne (Aalborg: Aalborg Universitet, 2000)14 Rasmussen. p 208
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about a French lawyer in Amsterdam who has an identity crisis. He lives in a Jewish
neighborhood where 75,000 people were deported to Auschwitz which he sees as the scene of
the biggest crime in history. An interesting view made by Rasmussen is how the protagonist
Clamence expresses ironic admiration of Holocaust, “I admire that diligence, that methodical
patience! When one has no character, one has to apply a method.”15 However, this attitude
ruins his relation to others and he is trying to improve himself as a human but always to
discover that he is too self involved. “I, I, I is the refrain of my whole life, which could be
heard in everything I said.”16 According to Rasmussen, this view recasts Pascal’s notion that
“Jeg’et er had-værdigt”17 and Kant’s “et jeg tænker skal altid kunne ledsage mine
forestillinger.”18 As such, Camus is with this story saying;
Identitskrisen er permanent og definitiv, når man hverken kan tilslutte sig et fællesskab eller et jeg. Det er ikke for meget sagt at, Clamence, denne vox clamantis in deserto, råber efter et nyt fællesskab og et nyt jeg, og at han er moden for at brud med traditionen.19
Returning to the philosophy of this period, we see different attacks aimed at the System, the
public, the totality, the hegemony and the identity i.e. everything that in some way expresses
power over something else. As such the basis of banal logical thinking, subsumption – that
something is something of a kind, or that something is deemed to be something else is
perceived as a not entirely innocent mental operation seeing that you hereby do something to
something (or someone) else. This means you change it from what it was in itself to what it
becomes to you. As a result according to Rasmussen, this prompted the philosophers to
deconstruct the Western way of thinking that build the Western world, which brings us to the
movement of postmodernism.
Postmodern thinking
Postmodernism, Postmodernity or the Postmodern is the term many sociologists,
philosophers, artists and cultural critics have employed as traits of today’s world. This is the
opinion made by Michael Rasmussen and the following part on Postmodernism will use
15 Camus, Albert. The Fall (New York: Random House Inc. 1956) p 716 Camus. p 1717 Rasmussen. p 20918 Rasmussen. p 20919 Rasmussen. p 209
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Fornuften og Synerne as previously mentioned. As touched upon earlier the emergence of
movements is still under debate and as such an exact time proves difficult. According to
Rasmussen, it surfaced around 1975 and the characteristics of the Postmodern can be seen
within architecture, sociology and philosophy of Western society. In architecture the
Postmodern is applied as a specific form, which blends earlier period styles. Hence it becomes
complex and eclectic without any apparent order or sense and it leaves the user with the
responsibility of interpreting the architecture as they see fit. As a result, the freedom of the
individual becomes evident due to the annulment of symmetry and overall perspective.
Sociology employs Postmodernity as the type of society emerged in the West where mass
media has taken the ideological power over the citizens who have become a silent majority of
consumers. According to Rasmussen, mathematical structures are implemented, even more in
everyday life such as bar codes, payment cards, computers etc. and the production process
becomes automated. Furthermore, the emergence of the Internet becomes a powerful symbol
of postmodernity and is described by Rasmussen as an all-embracing home without a centre
that houses all and where anyone can move incognito. As such in sociology, postmodern
stands for a new immensity, an absence of a centered possibility of orientation and
generalized plurality. According to Rasmussen, it is a world with only mutual connected units
but deprived of overall purpose and perspective.20 Furthermore, the postmodern claims the
right to ‘difference’ which means that any man, city, state etc. maintains the right to be
oneself which no family, country or supranational institution has the right to change. Thus,
Postmodernity is about management of one’s identity, i.e. about the effort to assume an
identity, which is not enforced in advance; basically it is about maintaining and validating
one’s freedom.
In philosophy, according to Jean-Francois Lyotard in The Postmodern Condition: A Report on
Knowledge the term the postmodern is about the condition of decay in Modernity, where
Lyotard views Postmodernism as Modernity’s ‘grand narratives’ which have collapsed.
According to Lyotard a grand narrative consists of three parts; the origin, then the
emancipation or division and lastly the atonement and as such modernity’s grand narratives
gather their validation in a future or idea, which will be carried out. This idea of for example
freedom or socialism has a legitimating value since it applies to all without exception. As a
result the characteristic structure of Modernity is ‘the project’, which concentrates on the
reestablishment of something lost and the implementation of the project will correspond to 20 Rasmussen. p 212
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man’s rediscovery of his identity. Consequently, Lyotard sees the Modernity project and its
legitimation21 forward in time, all while referring to a lost origin that can be reestablished and
made current again, such as God’s law as it applied in Paradise and as the classless society in
Marxism. However, the postmodern thought denies these ‘projects’ as naive and mendacious
because Lyotard sees “the postmodern condition” to be based on the dissolution of the grand
narratives. This is mainly due to the failure of East European communism that realized the
classless society was a lie and the false promise of liberal capitalism, which noted that
mankind, should gain wealth as the decisive condition for ultimate emancipation. However,
the world saw an emergence of economical crisis, GULAG and continued exploitation of
deprived countries. The final break with modernity, as Lyotard sees it, is in 1942 when the
Nazis decided total extermination of all Jewish people. With that the entire modern project
aimed at the liberation of mankind died. From this, Lyotard notes some prevailing negative
features of the postmodern,
a. hvad der uafviseligt findes, er sætninger og diskurser. Men metadiskursen findes ikke, ingen universel diskurs findes hvori diskursernes mangfoldighed kan integreres. Metadiskursen ville jo selv være et sprogspil. Syntesen er ugyldig, verden kan ikke være ’hel’.
b. dissensus er vigtigere end konsensus. Det gælder om at bekræfte diskursernes uforenelighed således at hver diskursgenre forbliver inden for sit område og ikke uretmæssigt overskrider det. Dette skal til for at undgå terroren.
c. generelt: det postmoderne defineres ved dette at udholde det inkommensurable, det ufremstillige, det sublime, det at tilværelsen ikke går op i en enhed.22
To sum the characteristics of sociology, philosophy and culture debate within the modern vs.
the postmodern, it becomes apparent that criticism has been the basic term of thinking in the
twentieth century. Furthermore, key words such as self development are important tools and
that there is no whole, no overall solution because everything is autonomous. But according to
Rasmussen, many people feel that the ideals of Western culture lack substance and are at the
same time irreversible. This leaves many people perplexed and this uncertainty, fear and crisis
result in often religious motivated attempts to seek back to a safe foundation. As a result, the
search for personal clarification is much coveted – in a time where everything is a mess; we
all want a definite and undisputed truth.
21 Lyotard, Jean-Francois. The Postmodern Condition: A Report On Knowledge (Manchester: Manchester University Press 1994) p 6 22 Rasmussen. p 215
15
The Postironical
The Postironical23
The American author David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) was according to Tore Rye
Andersen one of the leading figures in the American showdown with the postmodern and
ironical literature of the sixties and seventies.24 In Wallace’s work he argues that irony, which
had an oppositional role in the literature of the sixties and functioned as an important critical
weapon in the struggle against the establishment, has lost its literary value in the nineties.
According to him the sixties’ irony was first and foremost a characteristic of marginal
literature, the avant-garde, where it served as an effective critique of society. This aspect is
noted by Wallace in an interview where he says,
Irony and cynicism were just what the U.S. hypocrisy of the fifties and sixties called for. That’s what made the early postmodernists great artists. The great thing about irony is that it splits things apart, gets up above them so we can see the flaws and hypocrisies and duplicates. The virtuous always triumph? Ward Cleaver is the prototypical fifties father? "Sure." Sarcasm, parody, absurdism and irony are great ways to strip off stuff’s mask and show the unpleasant reality behind it.25
As such and as also mentioned in the introduction, postmodern irony was thus a healthy,
critical reaction against the System and a way of unmasking the conservative establishment,
of shaking the monolithical power in Washington. The problem is that during the eighties and
nineties, the System as Fredric Jameson has argued in Postmodernism, or The Cultural Logic
of Late Capitalism (1991) has transformed itself. It has increasingly turned into a flexible,
adaptive network, which has the ability to contain contradictions within itself. And as a result
of this increased adaptability of the System, it has become an elastic assimilation of the
ironical counter-language of the sixties. This is seen in the mainstream culture of television
where the previously effective catalogue of countercultural strategies has been transformed
and taken over, causing the rebellious and norm-breaking irony to lose its critical potential
and become a norm in itself. Consequently, Andersen argues that the rebellious and ironical
attitude of early Postmodernism can be found in a wide spectrum of today’s popular culture.
23 Main source Tore Rye Andersen’s Down With the Rebels!, 2005 24 Andersen. p 18725 McCaffery, Larry. An Interview With David Foster Wallace, 1993. p 147
16
The Postironical
Characteristics of the Postironical literature
Within the Postironical there seems to be an increased focus on family, where a postmodern
view would be a focus on society and the System. In postironical literature, the ties to society
seem to be replaced with the ties to family and this becomes a counter-system to the System.
According to Andersen, this changed focus is perhaps caused by the endless sitcoms that
writers like Wallace have been brought up on, but the influence of Don DeLillo’s White Noise
should also be taken into account because of the family-centred narrative.26 However, the
families of postironical literature are often dysfunctional. Andersen mentions authors like
Rick Moody, where the family in The Ice Storm (1994) is falling apart due to infidelity and
hypocrisy, and in Purple America (1997) also by Moody, a man leaves his sclerotic wife
because he simply does not have the energy to nurse her anymore. Another characteristic
would be the inclusion of reality into the world of fiction, which can manifest itself as simple
insistence that the author is telling a true story or by through the inclusion of the author’s own
as a subject matter. Again Andersen mentions Moody as an example, where he in his short
story Demonology (2001) tells the story of the tragic death of his sister, and ends it with
apologizing to the reader that he was not able to fictionalize the account more than was the
case. This incorporation of reality and personal notions in literature is at the same time a clear
contrast to the postmodern claim that everything including human identity is a fiction, which
also makes the postironical self-consciousness seem self-revealing and painful as supposed to
a cool aesthetic calculation, as often seen in postmodern literature. Furthermore, within the
postironical focus on near things such as family and the personal there is a slight adjustment
of postmodernism because the focus on near things does not exclude political awareness in
favor of self-centered contemplation, as one might think. The adjustment can be seen in the
way postmodernism often represents us as products and slaves of the System, whereas
postironical literature seems to be aware of that we in fact constitute the System. This means
that our role as helpless victims of this establishment is often caused by our own free choices
or habit of not taking responsibility.
The most important characteristic of the postironical is of course the reckoning with the irony
mainstream culture has taken and made it a norm without critical value. Andersen makes the
point that the mainstream culture of television has taken over the previously effective
catalogue of countercultural strategies and as a consequence of that the rebellious and ironical 26 Andersen. p 202
17
The Postironical
attitudes, as earlier mentioned, of early postmodernism can today be traced in the majority of
popular culture. Here, Andersen uses the advertising slogan of Macintosh, as an example that
states “Think different” which can be seen as rebellious compared to advertisement of the
sixties. During the fifties and the seventies even, advertising celebrated community and
played on the fear of being different, whereas today you have to stand outside in order to be a
part of the community.27 Furthermore, the issue continues within American television
entertainment where a cynical irony pervades a wide spectrum of sitcoms and also constitutes
the dominant rhetorical mode in late night talk shows. And the film industry of Hollywood is
also influenced by the mainstream cultures’ take on irony. This is seen through several
movies such as Pulp Fiction, where the narrative pattern is broken up and replaced with a-
chronological fragmented patterns which characterized the literature of the sixties.
Andersen also uses the film Pulp Fiction as an example of irony’s transformation from
genuine critical art to mainstream culture. According to Andersen, in the best postmodern
literature, irony serves a clear purpose and is directed toward a defined goal and is a means of
communicating a political message. But the irony used in Quentin Tarantino’s film does not
serve a visible purpose besides maintaining the shiny facades of the characters. This is an
example of what Fredric Jameson calls ‘blank irony’28 which can be compared with what
pastiche is to parody. Where parody is an imitation of a peculiar or unique style, pastiche is
the same but with a neutral practice of such mimicry and without any of parody’s ulterior
motives. As such blank irony becomes an imitation of irony and can be seen as directionless
irony, which is not committed to anything but a sly grin and which has lost all oppositional
force. According to Andersen, these observations lead to a less than desirable effect,
As a consequence of its assimilation into mainstream culture, irony has become a ubiquitous cool attitude, which has misplaced its critical potential and instead – in an implicit confirmation of the status quo – exempts its practitioners from taking a responsibility.29
This reckoning is then the central issue of the Postironical, but at the same time it is
paradoxically also the weakest part. As an example Andersen uses Danish film director Lars
Von Trier who he claims has a problem in being taken seriously due to his early works such
as The Element of Crime, Epidemic etc. which all contained a great deal of irony and
27 Andersen. p 18828 Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. p 1729 Andersen. p 189
18
The Postironical
metafictive elements. Trier now faces the difficulty of employing pathos within his work
because of his previous films. To further substantiate this claim, Andersen makes his point by
saying,
Irony is a stronger and less fragile rhetorical mode than pathos, since it is always already attacking itself, making a show of undermining itself and thus pre-empting attacks from without.30
The example mentioned above concerning film is something I will return to later, where I will
incorporate the aspect of the Postironical within film. An important point made by Andersen
is his notion of post ironists’ tendency to forget that the enemy is not postmodernism itself,
but it is the assimilated weak version created in mainstream culture. As a result of this,
according to Andersen, the critical attacks are often aimed at postmodern literature itself or
more precisely a constructed version of it made especially for this very purpose. Furthermore
the Postironical focus on irony is also valuable because it emphasizes how important a part of
modern American literature and culture irony is.
When examining the characteristics mentioned here, it becomes apparent that they exist
within the same as found in postmodern characteristic, however with some pivotal
differences. But the close similarity should not come as a surprise because as mentioned
earlier the aspect of the Postironical should not be seen as a clean break with Postmodernism,
but rather a revised continuation, which is simultaneously a break and an extension. It
employs formal traits from its predecessor, while at the same time exposing its aporia.
Revolt against the System
The main problem, which American writers encounter today, is how the mainstream culture
increasingly invade their territory thereby rendering them harmless. The main goal it to stay
out of the commercial circle in order to maintain a marginal position in the society they
criticize; because staying on the edge of the System makes it possible to incorporate critical
attacks against the System, and not become a part of it. Andersen uses the American author
Don DeLillo as an example of this, who has always tried to stay out of the commercial
market. But with his bestseller novel White Noise from 1985, it was no longer possible for
30 Andersen. p 204
19
The Postironical
DeLillo to maintain his role as a marginal writer. According to Andersen, this is the same
problem Wallace is faced with, because as he puts it, the great challenge for Wallace and
others of his generation is the creation of an updated, effective counter-language that does not
fall into the trap of what art critic Thierry de Duve calls avant-gardism, which is according to
him an ineffectual reproduction of a previous avant-garde; a reproduction that has no
relevance for and no effect upon its own immediate context.31 Andersen views it difficult for
these young writers to negate the ironical negativity aesthetics of the literature of the sixties,
without employing its own artistic effects and thus be caught up in the very tradition they are
trying to escape. As he puts it, “how can they criticize society and their literary predecessors
without automatically being accepted by mainstream culture whose principal language is the
postmodern counter-language?”32 By Andersen’s account Wallace does seem to have an
answer to this in one of his most well known novels, and this will be elaborated in the
following section.
Understanding the Postironical
As mentioned earlier Andersen uses American writer David Foster Wallace as the leading
figure on the issue of ironical literature. In his essay he argues that Wallace’s strength is first
and foremost etiological because he convincingly comments on what is wrong and why it is a
problem, but he fails to pose a clear, constructive alternative. However, Andersen argues that
Wallace’s novel Infinite Jest is an exception of that. I will not go into detail with this novel
but only briefly include some of its aspects. The reason for this is due to Andersen’s
perception of the novel as a foundational monument of what he describes as a postironical
movement in modern American literature.
The story of the 1996 novel Infinite Jest is set in the USA in the near future and deals with
addiction as the main theme. The characters are addicted to everything from substance abuse
to the TV-show M*A*S*H. According to Andersen, the novel then becomes a corrective to
the sixties’ glorification and mythologization of drugs, where Wallace concentrates on the
humiliating debasement involved in the desperate struggle for one more fix. This theme of
addiction also becomes a corrective to the American “pursuit of happiness” which is written
in the Declaration of Independence as a self-evident truth. According to Andersen, the
freedom to choose and the fear of letting your life be controlled from above have always been 31 Andersen. p 19232 Andersen. p 192
20
The Postironical
important themes in American literature. Furthermore, one could argue that this is the
collective opinion of Western society, however critical views on the subject of personal
freedom are something rarely, if not never, argued. This is also the case with Wallace who
sees that there is nothing inherently wrong with the personal freedom to choose, but he does
argue that this freedom does not necessarily lead to our common good. This is argued in the
novel by the American government agent who states that each American seeking to pursue his
maximum good results together in maximizing everyone’s good. However, later on the novel
argues that Americans manage their free choice at best dubiously because rather than preserve
a genuine freedom; they choose to submit to some higher purpose such as religion. So the
valued independence often leads to a form of dependence and the American citizen turns into
“the slave who believes he is free”.
The aspect mentioned above also substantiates Andersen’s claim of one of the characteristics
of the Postironical, namely that of political awareness. The example used here is an element
often seen in postmodernism; that we are represented as products and slaves of the System.
But this aspect becomes postironical due to Wallace’s notion that we in fact constitute the
System and that our role as helpless victims is caused by our own free choices.
The central metaphor of the novel is the movie created by the character James Incandenza that
like the title of the novel is called “Infinite Jest”. This is rather satirical described as lethal
movie which is so enjoyable to watch that you lose your desire to do anything but watch it
repeatedly in an infinite loop guaranteeing ‘infinite jest’. This aspect brings a comparison
between the movie and the novel itself, because according to Andersen Wallace’s novel is
also a very pleasurable read. However,
But where the movie “Infinite Jest” encourages passive consumption and surrender, the novel Infinite Jest demands that the reader take active part in integrating the fragments of the novel into more or less coherent vision.33
This is demonstrated by the possibly intentional lack of narrative convergence which is an
essential trait in the novel. Furthermore, this feature has much in common with Umberto
Eco’s theory on the open work that notes a new ambiguous depiction of the world where the
emphasis in the interpretational work has shifted from a sender-oriented to a receiver-oriented
33Andersen. p 196
21
The Postironical
understanding. This creates according to Andersen a kind of organized disorder in order to
increase the number of potential meanings and undermine the dominant cultural codes –
rather than being genuinely formless it creates the perfect illusion of formlessness. This also
supports the notion of Andersen’s idea of the postironical or at least one aspect of it. The
constructed chaos of ‘art’ is a part of the attempt to avoid reproduction of the system against
which art is in opposition. Here, again the revolt against the System seems to surface.
Moreover, it is argued by Tony Bennett that we should not discuss the interpretation of a text
but rather the reader’s ‘productive activation, of the potential discursive formations of the
text. The result of this notes that each reading of an open work differs according to the
perspective of the receiver, which means that the reader of Infinite Jest has the freedom to
choose which patterns to construct. Additionally, this aspect of freedom to choose compares
with earlier mentioned cultural theme of the novel namely the American “Pursuit of
Happiness”. The result of the open work in Infinite Jest means that the novel theoretically has
an infinite potential of meanings, but according to Andersen, the interpretations of open
works like Wallace’s novel have a tendency to converge towards some kind of common
denominator to coagulate in a broad consensus:
Wallace is fully aware that the originally wildly divergent interpretations of his novel will gradually be caught up in a curve bell – the curve of a normal distribution – but in order to counter the effectively as possible he has sprinkled his novel with a number of unbridgeable inconsistencies and narrative canyons which are so deep that they will hopefully ensure continued disagreements among the literary critics and sustain the manifold potential of the work.34
In his essay, Andersen claims that with Infinite Jest Wallace attempts to create an updated
complex realism and, hence, he sees how the novel combines Raymond Carver’s realist
fiction with the formal complexity of postmodernism, and it is an ambitious attempt at
creating a constructive alternative to the ironical postmodernism.
Theory conclusion
So far it has become clear to me that the concept of irony is difficult to define upon reading
the mentioned theorists’ opinions on the subject. One might even claim that the definition of
irony is still to be determined with a general consensus. However, this thesis is not concerned 34 Andersen. p 198
22
The Postironical
with the definition of irony but rather the meaning and use of it in postmodernism and as a
possible aspect of a new movement. According to Paul De Man’s deconstructive view, irony
is a form-dissolving figure, which destabilizes a text’s internal structures of signification and
reduces the meaning of widely different works to the same skeptical relativization of the
chances of communication and in this perspective a text is either ironical or earnest. However,
Wayne Booth’s rhetorical and pragmatic approach, argue that irony can be perceived as a
local temporary effect that communicates a specific message and does not necessarily
destabilize the whole work. Furthermore, it is argued that irony in visual arts may be easier to
detect than in literature due to the visual representations of “nudges” which in literature needs
to be written elaborately. In the section basis of movement, we see how postmodernism came
to surface and in doing that it became apparent how this movement denied an ultimate truth
within the sociology, philosophy of Western culture. The notion of this also connects with the
characteristics of the Postironical argued by Andersen where there is also a disbelief or
criticism of the System as an institution that governs society. However, Andersen noted that
there is a difference between the Postmodern and Postironical within this aspect, because the
Postironical recognizes that we in fact constitute the System and that our role as victims of
this establishment tends to be caused by our own free choices. Of course the most important
part of the theory is Tore Rye Andersen’s supposition on The Postironical in which he argues
the decreased meaning of irony as a critical tool against the System and the encroachment
mainstream culture has reduced irony into. The main task now is to put his theory into
practice and analyze two works by the film director Lars Von Trier who Andersen sees as a
possible Postironist.
Analysis
In this section I will apply Tore Rye Andersen’s theory on the Postironical within a non-
literary text which is film. The main focus of the analysis will be the work of the Danish film
film Lars von Trier due to Andersen’s claim that he exhibits strong Postironical traits.
According to Andersen, the central argument concerning Trier, is that the most important
characteristic of the Postironical – the reckoning with the irony that mainstream culture has
taken over from the postmodern rebels and made its own35, is at the same time paradoxically
its weakest and most fragile part.
35 Andersen. p 203
23
The Postironical
To support this claim you only have to turn to Danish movie director Lars von Trier’s Golden Heart-trilogy, which distances itself from his previous ironical phase. The main problem for this trilogy is that its creator, after ironical and metafictive works such as The Element of Crime and The Kingdom I-II, has a hard time being taken seriously in his attempts to employ a larger degree of pathos in his work.36
Andersen claims that Trier’s Golden Heart-trilogy tends to have a difficult time being taken
seriously due to his previous works, which included a large degree of irony and metafictive
elements. In Trier’s Breaking the Waves, Andersen does not believe that the church bells at
the end are supposed to be ironical, but because of Trier’s ironic history, they tend to be
perceived as such or at least forcedly pathetic even though the director employs a greater
amount of pathos in the film. On the basis of this I have chosen to analyze two of Lars von
Trier’s movies as an attempt to examine Andersen’s belief. The first movie will therefore be
Epidemic from 1987, which falls under the category of Trier’s ironical phase. Furthermore,
the analysis of this film will also examine the employment and meaning of irony in visual arts
as discussed in the theory section. The second film will be Breaking the Waves from 1996, the
movie on which Andersen partly bases his argument that Von Trier struggles to be taken
seriously and thereby making him a Postironist. It should also be noted that analyzing the
mentioned films will be done using some of the theory aspects in Analyse af Billedmedier
(2006) by Gitte Rose and H.C. Christiansen with focus on the Neoformalistic film analysis.
The reason I have chosen this form is because it functions as a tangible and in film analysis,
and is an approach focusing on how film functions as a system consisting of a narrative and
stylistic system. Neoformalism concentrates, as the name implies, on the form and is therefore
suitable to analyze a film’s fundamental appearance. Furthermore, this method also examines
cognitive film theory, which is argued that watching a film is an active perception process.
Filmens plot giver os ’cues’, på baggrund af hvilke, tilskueren kan drage slutninger og dermed skabe en sammenhængende story. (…)cognitive filmteorier gør det muligt ud fra vores viden om menneskets kognitive emotionelle kapaciteter teoretisk at kortlægge, hvordan vi generelt oplever og indlever os i filmens fiktion.37
36 Andersen. p 20437 Rose, Gitte / Christiansen, H.C. Analyse af billedmedier – en introduktion (2006) p 147
24
The Postironical
The aspect of this becomes suitable in connection with the issue Andersen argues about Lars
von Trier’s struggle with irony and pathos in film. It should be noted that the Neoformalistic
analysis is a theory coined by David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson,
David Bordwells og Kristin Thompsons Film Art. An Introduction, udkom første gang I 1979 og har neofomalismen som det understående fundament. (…) Til forskel fra strukturalismen er Bordwell og Thompsons neoformalistiske tilgang målrettet mod analysen af, hvordan filmen som særegent medie anvender narration og stil.38
As such Rose and Christiansen have formed an organized view of their theory. When
analyzing a film using the method mentioned above, it is reasonable to do so by dividing the
analysis into two sections. The first should be examining the film’s narrative structure, which
involves establishing the story, plot, characters, motivations etc. The second section should be
an analysis of the film’s stylistic structure, which establishes how the film is portrayed
through visual and audible elements. Lastly, the two should then be combined to determine
how the two structures function in the specific film. Furthermore, along with the
Neoformalistic analysis the characteristics of the Postironical will be taken into account.
Epidemic’s narrative structure
Epidemic from 1987 is a film directed by Lars Von Trier who also wrote the screenplay in
collaboration with Niels Vørsel. It marks the second film in Von Trier’s Europa trilogy which
also includes The Element of Crime (1984) and Europa (1991). The three films are not a
narrative trilogy but rather linked by common themes and stylistic explorations. The overall
subject of the trilogy can be seen as the social crisis of postwar Europe. Each of the three
movies follows a character whose idealistic actions ultimately perpetuate the very problem
she seeks to solve.
The film’s story revolves around two film writers Lars and Niels, who one day discover that
the film manuscript they have been working on for two years has somehow been erased on
their computer. They cannot seem to remember the story, which they did not find interesting
anyway, so instead they start to write a new last minute-script for their producer: a film about
the idealistic Dr. Mesmer, who in his effort to fight a deadly pest epidemic discovers that he
38 Rose/Christiansen. p 146-147
25
The Postironical
in fact is the one who managed to spread the disease. The film follows the writing process as
well as scenes from the movie they are writing and as the script develops, it also starts to
creep into the real world around Lars and Niels. It becomes apparent to the viewer from the
start that Epidemic is far from the typical Hollywood film, which is seen through its narrative
structure. The characteristics of a typical Hollywood or mainstream movie is by
Rose/Christiansen described to be films, that appeal to our most basic emotions and they will
do so through a high level of redundancy, which I will elaborate later on. The first scene
begins very abruptly without a title sequence where we instead see Niels making a phone call
to Lars informing him that he is about to print out the script they have been working on for
two years. The lack of title sequence is replaced with the title, “FØRSTE DAG”39 which
functions as a form of chapter that also gives the audience a sense of time. As it turns out the
disk containing the script has unfortunately been erased and the two writers are forced to
rewrite it all again with only five days left before they have to present it to a representative
from the Danish Film Institute. In their attempt to remember the script, they both come to the
conclusion that it was a poor one and decide to write a new story. In the scene we see Niels
typing the title of the new script on a typewriter, and as he types, the word ‘EPIDEMIC’ also
appears in the top left corner of the screen and stays visible for the duration of the movie. This
aspect becomes metafictive and is further supported by the following scene where we hear a
voice-over telling us the story we are about to see. In addition, the voice-over is narrated
during a panoramic view of the aftermath of the last scene of the film which also is a
supporting metafictive feature. The element of metafiction within film becomes a central
theme in Epidemic and is a subject I will elaborate on. As the story continues, the voice-over
appears now and again keeping the viewer informed of the developing epidemic that is
spreading throughout the world.
Motivation and narration
When analyzing the narrative system of a film, it is also appropriate to look at the plot. Within
this work, the plot represents a film’s narration and this can be done in different ways, where
the distribution of information is an important aspect. The extent of knowledge provided by
the plot can be divided in to concepts called limited and unlimited narration.40 As an example,
the detective film will often limit the extent of information and our knowledge is therefore
tied to the protagonist. In a melodramatic film, however, the audience is often presented with 39 Trier, Lars Von / Vørsel, Niels. Epidemic (1987) t 00:00:1540 Rose/Christiansen. p 150
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The Postironical
more knowledge than the characters. The latter form, where all information is given is called
an omniscient narrative strategy and the former can be described as a personal narrative
strategy. In Epidemic there is a use of unlimited narration and the audience is presented with
an omniscient strategy, which is seen through the use of the aforementioned voice-over. The
difference between the unlimited and limited narration can function as what Alfred Hitchcock
exemplified as the difference between surprise and suspense. We are surprised if a bomb
which we had no previous knowledge of suddenly explodes, while suspense is created if we
see a bomb with a timer in the hands of a child - and thereby has more knowledge than the
characters’ plan of action. On the basis of this, the audience would expect Epidemic to display
elements of suspense through its omniscient narrative, where the voice-over in the beginning
informs us of the fact that an actual epidemic outbreak will collide with the completion of the
script that the two main characters are writing. With this information, the film eliminates the
notion of surprise as the audience is made aware of the story’s outcome. Nevertheless, as the
last scene will prove, the viewer does experience an element of surprise. However, this is not
perceived through omniscient narration, but rather created through Epidemic’s sudden change
between ironic distance and pathos.
Within the narrative structure of a film, it is important, according to Rose/Christiansen, that
the audience have an interest in the characters which necessitates their actions to be well
motivated.41 Mainstream movies often utilize a high degree of motivation i.e. that the elements
emphasized should have reason to be there. In this respect, it is important for the mainstream
film that cause and effect make sense, and that both the story and characters create coherence.
Within the notion of this, four different types of motivation exist,
Bordwell skelner mellem fire forskellige former for motivation, hvor de tre første er de mest udbredte, og hvor den sidste ofte først træder i kraft, når de andre tre ikke er relevante.42
There is the compositional motivation, which is often expressed when a piece of information
is given in the beginning of a film and is motivated by the importance of this which is
revealed later on. The transtextual motivation is typically practiced when a genre film has
related to certain norms, as an example a romantic comedy should have the main characters
fall in love in the end. The realistic motivation is always bound to what the viewer perceives
to be realistic at a given time. It can be a character trait, an action or technology; in a science-
41 Rose/Christiansen. p 15242 Rose/Christiansen. p 152
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The Postironical
fiction movie it would be realistically motivated to take a spaceship instead of a car. Lastly,
there is the artistic motivation, which is somewhat difficult to characterize, but generally is
related to stylistic traits which do not have an explicit purpose in regards to the plot, but is to a
larger degree present as an atmospheric marker. What is interesting here in regards to
Epidemic is the noticeable lack of motivation the film presents. As a viewer it becomes
difficult to connect to the characters because their actions do not seem to be clearly motivated.
An example of this can be found in the third chapter called “Tredie Dag – Tyskland”, where
Lars and Niels drive to Germany in what seemingly is an attempt to find inspiration for their
script. As such their actions appear to be motivated, but as the audience follows their visit
around Germany, it becomes evident that they do not achieve much from this and the
audience is confused about the significance of this. In connection with the aforementioned
view on the film’s unlimited narration, the lack of motivation also eliminates an element of
suspense and as such Epidemic increases the audiences’ lack of interest.
Ironic distance
The subject of irony is a central theme in Epidemic and is projected throughout the film as we
follow the creation of a manuscript being developed. The use of irony is an aspect the viewer
is subjected to from the beginning of the movie or to be more exact the irony appears in the
second scene of Epidemic. After Niels calls Lars to tell him that he has problems printing out
their script, Lars decides to come to Niels’ apartment. Lars enters a taxicab and tells the driver
he needs to go to Store Kongensgade. The taxidriver looks at him and nods, starts the
taximeter and puts the car in gear. As he puts his foot on the gas pedal, the car starts going
backwards. He tries again and the same thing happens. As he keeps trying to get it in first
gear, Lars and the taxi driver look at each other and suddenly the cab driver burst out
laughing. Lars responds; “Hvis du fortsætter på den måde, så skylder du mig penge…om
lidt.”43 The driver nods and tries again, but he cannot stop laughing so Lars exits the car and
the scene ends. At this point we, the audience, are confused because how are we supposed to
interpret this particular scene. The episode does not seem to promote the story or plot in any
way and as such the scene becomes ironic, which is expressed on different levels. On the
surface it is ironic that Lars meets a taxi driver who does not know how to drive, but
underneath the obvious, the irony emerges through its distancing with the audience. This is
seen through the actors’ less than professional performance in the scene, which to the viewer
43 Epidemic t 00:02:43
28
The Postironical
looks like an outtake – this is also further supported by the actor who plays the cab driver,
Michael Simpson, who explains that Trier did not give him any instruction when shooting the
episode and that he in fact could not find the first gear, which made him laugh. Because of
this, the film demonstrates once again its metafictive demeanor for the reason that it shows
the audience its position as fiction.
Epidemic is filled with scenes like the one mentioned above and the ironic distancing
becomes noticeable throughout the film. There are several episodes where the audience is
constantly subjected to seemingly pointless conversations and meaningless actions. We
follow a conversation where the two writers discuss with a friend on which wine to serve at
their dinner with the film consultant which does not claim any attachment to the story of the
film. We hear about audio tapes of Niels’ pen pals in Atlantic City that was an experiment
where Niels was trying to write a novel, which again has nothing to do with the main story of
Epidemic. In these scenes, the irony is displayed through the distance Trier creates between
the narrative and himself.
Rules and commitment
There are circumstances that ensure our commitment to a character and these are met if the
character lives up to our person schemata44 - our perception of what constitutes a well
balanced person with human characteristics. When we have established that we are dealing
with such a character, then we are faced with two possibilities. The first possibility is to
express empathy towards the person which entails an immediate and condition-less reaction to
a character’s emotions. This can be seen when we are introduced to a person, who we do not
necessarily know anything about, be subjected to pain or when we react to a characters
expressed emotion of grief or joy. The second possibility is sympathy, where the viewer is
urged to find interest in the character and its motivations, beliefs and moral codes, which can
be described as alignment. If a person acts in an unacceptable way, we will presumably not
identify with him/her. However if we at the same time obtain knowledge of his/her thoughts
and motivations, it can create what is called allegiance.45 To sum up, alignment is the method
a movie’s plot chooses to present the fictional characters, which provides us with the
preconditions to decide if we experience allegiance with them. Allegiance is then the
conscious choice the viewer makes in light of the plot, whether we can connect with a 44 Rose / Christiansen p 15345 Rose / Christiansen p 154
29
The Postironical
character’s morale and motives.46 The commitment to a character is therefore an easy way to
ensure interest in a film and as such it is often practiced in mainstream movies. Again, this is
one of the aspects Trier criticizes and this is portrayed by the lack of interest and commitment
that the audience has with the characters in Epidemic, where the film’s alignment does not
create any allegiance between the audience and Lars and Niels. This aspect is the direct
opposite of what characterizes a mainstream film, which is also pointed out by
Rose/Christiansen,
Hollywood-fortællingen er karakterbåren, og derfor er det netop karakterernes udvikling og målrettethed, som styrer og skaber fortællingens fremdrift.47
However, the episodes mentioned do seem to be validated in one respect when analyzing the
film and that is the motto, Lars states in the scene regarding the discussion of a movie’s
dramaturgy. At one point in this scene, Lars says, “En film bør være som en sten I skoen.”48
and this is in reality quite true about Epidemic, which is confirmed by the scenes mentioned
above. Furthermore, by Trier’s own admission he notes that the audience would be so bored
that they would walk out of the theater which makes these scenes deliberate and necessary.
This aspect also becomes a central part of Trier’s position as a Postironist when applying
Andersen’s theory on the Postironical. The ironic narrative structure of Epidemic is Trier’s
comments and criticism of mainstream film culture, which he is clearly against. This aspect is
supported when taking the structure of typical mainstream film into account.
As mentioned earlier, according to Rose/Christiansen, the traditional Hollywood or
mainstream movie often follows a certain set of narrative and stylistic structures and as such
appeals broadly to the general public. They note a common characteristic which mainstream
films seem to practice – that they appeal to the most basic emotions in people; to love and
hate, to win and lose, to laugh and cry, which are emotions we all recognize and therefore
cannot help but commit to.49 Conversely, Epidemic does not appeal to any of these basic
emotions and in fact tries to avoid them as much as possible. Furthermore, according to
Ross/Christiansen mainstream films often contain a high degree of redundans50 (redundancy)
to ensure that the audience can follow the action. If it is important that a character should be 46 An example of this method, as seen in various mainstream, is when the protagonist Harry Potter who appears humble and subdued, almost automatically creates an allegiance between the audience and him.47 Rose/Christiansen p 14548 Epidemic t 00:27:3749 Rose / Christiansen p 15650 Rose / Christiansen p 149
30
The Postironical
perceived as evil, this can be made clear to the audience by making him kick a dog or violent
to children. In Epidemic there is a clear lack of redundancy and we in fact do not know how to
perceive the characters because at one point they seem sincere and at another they are being
ironic. Not knowing how to react to the characters is also an aspect Rose/Christiansen
comments on concerning the audience’s commitment to the characters. In the mainstream film
the viewer does not necessarily need to experience the same feeling as the character does, but
the audience should, however, be able to emotionally invest in the character.
In addition, the criticism of the mainstream film by Trier leaves the question on how to
categorize Epidemic as film genre. According to Rose/Christiansen the narrative structure that
characterizes classic film genres is disrupted in other forms of fiction films. Where the
mainstream film is often characterized by a goal-oriented hero, an art film is done so by
another set of values. Art film can be seen as the common term to describe modern European
and American independent films and these are often experimental fiction movies. The
essential aspect in these films is not so much the story but rather the correlation between the
style and the themes that the story’s unsolvable problems introduce. The problems in art film
are often existential and therefore needs unusual solution strategies and we as audience are
not presented with a solution to the problems art films create which often ends with an open
interpretation. On the basis of this, Epidemic falls into the category of an art film.
Epidemic’s stylistic structure
A film’s narrative structure and style is two sides of the same coin. In the typical mainstream
movie, the style contributes to a clear representation of the plot, which provides the audience
with the best possibilities to create a coherent story. However, when dealing with an art film,
the opposite occurs where the style will often be a significant and clear contributor to the film.
While Epidemic is a part of a trilogy created by Trier, the film differs from his previous films,
which is seen through the low budget-style that dominates the majority of Epidemic. Most of
the scenes are shot with a 16 mm handheld camera providing the movie with a certain low
budget look. This, when a certain aesthetic strategy is removed, another takes its place and
furthermore, the film’s expression becomes a natural occurrence based on the results of
circumstances on which Epidemic was created – the idea of the movie was produced on a
wager with one condition. Epidemic was to be produced on a budget of one million Danish
kroner and even in the 1980s that was considered extremely low, because the average Danish
31
The Postironical
feature film at the time was on a budget eight times higher. Additionally, the idea of creating
low-budget films as an artistic experiment became a central theme in Trier’s later movies
which also resulted in the 1995 Dogme manifesto where restrictions and “vows of chastity”
would help to create new ideas within film.51 As such Epidemic can be seen as the beginning
of Trier’s revolt against the film industry and criticism of the System within film business. On
the basis of this, Trier becomes an interesting ‘author’ in connection with Andersen’s theory
on the Postironical where Trier would seemingly prove to be considered a Postironist – the
aspect of this is something I will return to later on.
Metafiction
Throughout the film, the viewer is constantly presented with meta effects such as microphone
tripods and lamps visible in many of the frames. Furthermore, the sound of the 16 mm camera
can often be heard and all these aspects serve as self referenced meta functions creating a
form of ‘verfremdungseffekt’52 telling us we are watching something recorded and staged. In
terms of metafiction, the film can be said to operate with two stories on two different levels;
To separate the two, one should be defined as the fictive level and the other as the
documentary level. Through the aesthetic structure it becomes easy for the viewer to
distinguish the two levels due to the fact that the story where we follow Niels and Lars is
filmed with a handheld 16 mm black/white camera giving us the impression of a
documentary.
“Det er siden 1960erne blevet almindeligt at benytte håndholdte kameraer, der videregiver de rystelser, der fremkommer, når kameramanden bevæger sig. Håndholdte kameraoptagelser afgiver således subjektcentrerede informationer. Fordi bruger af håndholdt kamera i begyndelsen særligt blev benyttet til dokumentar og reportage, opfattes håndholdt kamera ofte som en særlig realistisk teknik (…) Når f.eks. dogme-instruktører sværger til det håndholdte kamera, er det formodentlig udtryk for et ønske om en realistisk æstetik.”53
The fictive level that follows the story they are writing is filmed with a 35 mm black/white
camera, which gives us a more clean and filmic perception. As such, the film shifts between
two expression or two types of film language that consists of a perfectioned style and a raw,
low-budget style.51 See appendix 52 The term refers to the German dramatist-director Bertolt Brecht, who coined this form of distancing effect practiced within theater, and involves the use of techniques designed to distance the audience from emotional involvement in the play through jolting reminders of the artificiality of the theatrical performance. 53 Grodal. P 39
32
The Postironical
A Postmodern film
From reviewing Epidemic it becomes apparent that the immediate story is a film about the
creation of a film and as such it is a meta film: a film that proclaims itself as fiction and
makes the audience aware of this. The aspect of metafiction is at the same time a highly
postmodern element because it serves as a demonstration of fiction as a theme. And this is
exactly the case in Epidemic because it explicitly deals with its own status as fiction and at the
same time reflects on the relationship between fiction and non-fiction. It becomes even more
evident that this film shows strong aspects of being a postmodern film. This notion is
supported by applying Rose/Christiansen’s statement concerning Postmodernism in film.
Rose and Christiansen have in their theory book listed a number of common postmodern
characteristics within the media of film and TV,
Et postmoderne værk vil ofte være kendtegnet ved at: Den traditionelle, narrative struktur opløses Fortællingen mangler entydige konklusioner, eller omvendt, leverer til tider flere as slagsen Form, æstetik, fortællestruktur of tematik kendetegnes ved lag-på-lag teknik Fremstillingsformen blander former og figurer og retoriske strategier som ironi, pastiche,
eklekticisme, metakommentering, distancering m.m. De mennesketyper der optræder, er af menneske-maskine hybridkarakter Kontakten mellem mennesker er præget af fejlopfattelser og misforståede forventninger Fortællingens ånd kan være gennemsyret af dyb, diffus angst, en nervøs og frygtsom grundtone
og en rastløs atmosfære. Handlingens brændpunkt formodes altid at foregå uden for den enkeltes rækkevidde.54
What is interesting about this list is that Epidemic displays almost all of the characteristics
mentioned. In the film there is a clear lack of narrative logic, where the audience is presented
with two different stories. In the final scene everyone succumbs to the disease and Lars is the
only one left alive and as such the film has an ambiguous ending and is without a definite
conclusion, where the viewer is unsure of its meaning. The story combines different themes
and strategies, which is seen through its use of irony, metafictive elements and distancing. It
is also noticeable how the two main characters seem to be depicted as human machines who
distance themselves from the rest of the world. This is also further perceived by the notion of
what Rose/Christiansen describes as misunderstood expectations. An example of this can be
seen in the scene with the actor Udo Kier, who Lars and Niels find boring despite the fact that
he is telling them a horrific story from his own life. This scene also becomes interesting in
connection to the Postironical which is an aspect I will return to later on. The last
54 Rose/Christiansen. p 65-67
33
The Postironical
characteristic on the list mentioned above also proves to exist in Epidemic. The bubonic
plague that slowly infects the world around the two main characters becomes increasingly
apparent as the story develops, and through both narrative and stylistic elements, the film
portrays a restless atmosphere. On the basis of this, Epidemic becomes a classic example of
the postmodern film by containing these characteristics. Within this perspective a paradox
exists, due to the nature of Postmodernism that claims emancipation from the System and is
not to be determined by any norms. All in all films that are marked with postmodern
aesthetics will not seem especially coherent and additionally they will not be able to create a
clear picture of any cultural state. Conversely, it provides the viewer with several themes,
revised language usage and symbolism to work with.
The film focuses on the metafictive film’s will to thematize itself and the world in one
movement, and by doing this, it points to its own staging. An example of this can be seen in a
humorous scene where Niels and Lars are talking about the possible dramaturgy. We see them
drawing a line on the wall in Niels’ apartment and Lars says, “Omkring to tredjedele henne ...
her må vi lave en eller anden form for drama ... på det tidspunkt vil folk kede sig ... De vil
sikkert kede sig før, men på det her tidspunkt vil de kede sig så meget, at de overvejer at gå”55.
In addition of being metafictive, they are also being ironic about the common demands of a
movie’s dramaturgy and structure. Furthermore, the scene becomes even more ironic because
Lars’ statement seems to predict the dramaturgy of the film, the audience are actually
watching.
The ending scene
As mentioned earlier, Lars and Niels decide to write a new script in only five days, called
Epidemic, about a mysterious, bubonic disease which the authorities, in vain, try to defeat.
The film cuts between scenes from the movie they are writing and scenes from their everyday
life, working on the new script. As Niels and Lars research their story, we see scenes from the
movie where the young idealistic doctor Mesmer played by Trier, who despite threats and
admonitions from medical authorities, goes out to the outskirt areas to fight the epidemic. His
actions become tragic and ironic because it turns out that he carries the disease himself, and
due to his idealism and desire to help the world, he ends up being the one who spreads the
infection. While Lars and Niels continue their work on the script, a bubonic epidemic is also
55 Epidemic. t 00:25:23
34
The Postironical
spreading in ‘reality’ and in the last scene, where they try to convince the film consultant of
the validity of their idea, the disease breaks out and fiction and reality collide in a grotesque
chaos. This last scene is ten minutes long and takes place in Niels’ apartment where the two
writers have been working for the last five days. They have invited the film consultant to
dinner as well as the hypnotist Sven Ali Hamann who hypnotizes the girl Gitte into telling the
story of Epidemic which according to Lars and Niels is an attempt to present their idea in a
differentiated way:
En pige er i dyb hypnose. Hendes hoved hviler nede på brystet, mens hun lytter til hypnotisørens messende og insisterende stemme, der befaler hende at “gå ind i” Epidemic. At gå ind i filmen Epidemic. Kameraet zoomer ind på pigen og hypnotisøren, mens en udefra kommende, agressiv og overdøvende lyd fortrænger alle reallyde. De to filmmagere ser smilende og skeptiske til. Pigen begynder tøvende at fortælle: “Der er døde mennesker overalt....der er rotter med haler så lange... inde i husene er der mennesker. De råber...på Gud, tror jeg. Og der er børn....de begynder at klynke....er så frygtelig bange.....de har bylder over det hele....de....dør på gaden”. Pigen taler længe om de forfærdelige syner og begynder at græde, som gør det fysisk ondt på hende at gennemleve billederne, der trænger sig på inde i hendes hoved. En arm strækkes ind i billedfeltet, håndleddet er dækket med en stor byld. Pigen græder stadig højere. Hypnotisøren forsøger at berolige hende, mens filmkonsulenten og de to filmmagere ser stadigt mere usikre og bekymrede ud. Den hypnotiserede pige rejser sig, vakler hen mod væggen og synker her sammen, mens hypnotisøren forsøger at få hende til at forlade filmen Epidemic. Med et sæt farer hun op og kaster sig skrigende op på bordet. Hendes hals er nu dækket med bylder, og vi ser en byld i nærbillede blive perforeret med en gaffel. Niels’ kone Susanne står grædende ovre ved væggen, hvor hun kaster op, mens filmkonsulenten med et overnaturligt ryk slynges tilbage fra bordet. Med ét bliver der stille. Kameraet panorerer hen over bordet, hvor pigen ligger døende og sitrer. Niels ligger på knæ hos sin kone, der, efter at have kastet blod op på væggen, er død. Billedet fader over i et billede af Lars, der sidder sammensunket i et hjørne. Han løfter hovedet og kigger op, og frem toner et billede af en motorvej set oppefra. Lyden af vindens susen og trafikkens svage støj er eneste lydkilde, indtil sangen “Epidemic - we all fall down” toner frem, og rulleteksterne tager over.56
Perhaps the most interesting aspect in Epidemic is this last scene, which as often in Trier’s
films proves to be a central turning point concerning the films climax and upcoming end. To
let a movie reach its climax in the final scene without any form of aftermath or fade-out is
unusual within the classic dramaturgy, which is also pointed out by Lars in the earlier
mentioned scene where he notes that the climax should be introduced within 2/3 of the
timeline. This is usually where all plot elements come together and the puzzle is solved. This,
however, is neglected in Epidemic and as such the viewer is left without a cathartic
satisfaction. This form of mental release of tension was theorized by Aristotle in his work
Poetics and is elaborated by Grodal,
Aristoteles mente, at gennemlevelsen af stærke følelser forårsaget af fiktion f.eks. tragedier, medførte ”katharsis”, en slags renselse, uden at han nærmere præciserede af hvilken art, denne
56 Nielsen, Lisbeth Overgaard. Lars Von Triers Film (2007) p 69
35
The Postironical
katharsis var. Senere teoritikere har som f.eks. Freud fortolket katharsis som en slags afløb for indre mentale spændinger. Nyere psykologiske teorier har derimod fortolket interessen for at gennemleve stærke følelser gennem fiktion i lyset af en teori om ’homeostase’, ligevægt.57
Through this notion it is suggested that over time people seek to maintain an even level of
excitement. If a person is mentally understimulated; he or she will seek out exciting events,
whereas an overstimulated person will avoid these.
This inconclusive ending in Epidemic proves again to be highly postmodern because it denies
a clear conclusion of the movie’s plot or perhaps it offers more than one. The scene stands in
contrast to the rest of the film, which is seen through the narrative aspects depicted here. As
mentioned earlier Epidemic displays a lack of allegiance towards the characters and distances
itself from its characters. This scene however, does attempt to create some form of alignment
to the girl who is being hypnotized. We are able to empathize with the girl who expresses pain
and sorrow through the hypnosis because the fact that we do not know anything about her
denotes that we have no reason to doubt her person schemata.
The ironic interpretation
In connection with the Postironical, the last scene becomes interesting due to Andersen’s
notion on the effect irony has on a certain text. As mentioned earlier, Paul De Man had a
deconstructive concept of irony and furthermore described it as a ‘permanent parabasis’ and
in this respect a text is either ironical or earnest. In Epidemic the viewer has throughout the
film been subjected to an ironic distancing between the audience and the movie and as such
the last scene must also be perceived as ironic. However, as Wayne Booth points out, irony
can in a rhetorical and pragmatic perspective be perceived as a local, temporary effect that
communicates a specific message and does not necessarily destabilize the whole work. I do
believe that this is the case in Epidemic because the last scene in my opinion is not meant to
be ironic and it does not undermine the whole film. This is further established through the
stylistic structure of the ending scene. As mentioned earlier, the part of the film where we
follow the two writers’ daily work is filmed with a 16 mm camera which has a documentary
effect, and the scenes of the movie they are creating are shot with a 35 mm camera which has
a more traditional filmic outcome. However, in the beginning of the last scene, the hypnotist
says, “Må vi gå igang?”58 and just after this the camera switches for a brief moment into a 35
57 Grodal. p 6858 Epidemic. t 01:27:03
36
The Postironical
mm shot of the dinner table and the people around it while a ominous, dark musical tone is
played. The stylistic setting of this scene suddenly rejects the previous ironic distancing,
which the audience has been subjected to, and has now transformed into a collision between
fiction and reality. It is an immensely powerful scene, which is supported by the woman
Gitte’s performance under the hypnosis that furthermore has the audience doubting the scene
as an act. This last scene becomes a pivotal issue in the theory of the Postironical, where both
De Man and Booth disagree on the influence of irony. As I mentioned before, I do not believe
that the ironic aura of Epidemic cancels the pathos of the last scene but this perception can in
one respect be caused by my own interpretation of the work. If we were to take Andersen’s
analysis of Infinite Jest into account, the issue of perception becomes an individual task.
According to Andersen, this novel has much in common with Umberto Eco’s theory of the
open work where the emphasis in the interpretational work has shifted from a sender-oriented
to a receiver-oriented understanding. This could very much be the same case in Epidemic if
the interpretation is to be ruled by the receiver and not Trier himself. As a result of this, the
perception of whether the last scene observes irony or not is determined by the audience and
their individual interpretations. Consequently, the last scene could therefore be split in to two
different understandings, where an ironic perception would have a comical result that sees
Trier attempting to depict the hypnosis as a parody. However, if the receiver chooses to leave
the irony behind, the scene takes a different approach. In this case, the hypnosis can be
interpreted as the relation between the effect of hypnosis and the effect a film can have on a
viewer, which is demonstrated by the woman’s vivid and empathic identification with the
epidemic. It should be noted that Eco’s theory is based on literature and as such the practice
of applying this concept to film may be questionable. Nevertheless, I see a plausible
employment of the open work within film, due to the postmodern characteristic portrayed in
Epidemic. As mentioned earlier Rose/Christiansen stated a postmodern film will often depict
a story without an unequivocal conclusion, and instead present the viewer with multiple
interpretations. Accordingly this characteristic bears much resemblance with a receiver-
oriented understanding.
Conclusion of Epidemic
It can be concluded that Epidemic is highly postmodern as seen through the use of metafictive
aspects and ironic distancing, which the film carries. This leaves the question concerning
37
The Postironical
Andersen notion of Trier as a Postironist. In order to analyze his claim, the characteristics of
the Postironical should be taken into consideration in connection with Epidemic. From
examining the film, it becomes clear that the movie holds several of these characteristics and
the first one, I will mention is Andersen’s notion of the inclusion of reality in a world of
fiction. This aspect is seen through a number of elements within the film and the first most
noticeable notion of this is displayed through the character portrayals.
Both Trier and Vørsel play the main characters or protagonists in Epidemic; they are
portrayed as a film director and writer which they both, in fact, are in real life and this is also
the case for the rest of the cast who portray themselves. Furthermore, I would like to
emphasize a specific example in the film where the inclusion of reality comes to its most
pivotal significance in connection to the Postironical. In their research for the new script the
two writers decide to take a trip to Germany as a change of scenery and means of inspiration.
While they are in Cologne, they visit the actor Udo Kier who tells them a story about his
mother and the day he was born. The interesting aspect here is the fact that Kier is telling Lars
and Niels a true story from his own life. He tells that the day his was born, during World War
II, the British military bombed the hospital in an air raid where he and his mother were. The
story becomes even more horrific when he tells that his mother saw the effects phosphor
bombs had on human skin and how people ran around screaming in agony. However, Lars
and Niels look bored and uninterested in his story even when Kier starts to cry which leaves
the viewer quite confused. Due to this tragic and shocking story woven in with the two
writers’ reaction, the viewer is not sure how to react to this. Furthermore, the ironic distancing
throughout the film is also a factor, which leaves the viewer confused. This inclusion of
reality and the personal in Epidemic constitutes a clear contrast to the Postmodern insisting
that everything – even human identity – is a fiction and at the same time it makes the
Postironical’s self-consciousness seem honestly self-revealing and painful rather than cool,
aesthetic calculating.
As mentioned earlier the perhaps strongest characteristic of the Postironical, according to
Andersen, is the reckoning that mainstream culture taken over irony and made its own. In
Epidemic one could certainly argue that Trier falls under the category of artists who join this
revolt against mainstream’s watered down version of irony. However, I find Trier not to limit
himself to the notion of irony but rather to a broader spectrum of mainstreams calculated
methods. It is true that Trier uses irony as a critical tool in order to comment on the System,
38
The Postironical
but the System in this case in not the conservative establishment or monolithical
government.In Trier’s case it seems that his criticism is aimed at the film industry and that
Epidemic is a reaction to the Danish Film Institute where directors such as Nils Malmros and
Bille August were praised for their work. This notion is also supported in Epidemic as Trier
takes the role of Dr. Mesmer, where parallels can be drawn to Trier’s own idealism. In the
new script they are writing, Trier plays the role of the young doctor who goes against the
medical System who threatens and warns him against disobeying their rules. In comparison to
reality, Trier is seeing himself as the idealistic director who despite established ‘laws’ within
filmmaking chooses to turn his attention in a different direction. If one were to be plain, Trier
is on a quest to liberate the world of mainstream films which are as an epidemic. However,
Andersen does, in one aspect, seem to be right in classifying Trier as a Postironist when
analyzing the aforementioned example. At the same time as Trier is criticizing the industry,
he is also being self-conscious about the situation. This is substantiated by the outcome of Dr.
Mesmer’s mission to cure the disease. As mentioned earlier he realizes at the end that he was
the one who in fact spread the very epidemic he was trying to eliminate.
Returning to a conclusion of the analysis of Epidemic, I argue that while the film is greatly
filled with ironic elements, it does not determine the whole work to be ironic due to the
factors mentioned above. To further substantiate my claim, the theory of irony in visual arts
has to be taken into account. As I have touched upon earlier, the recognition of irony in visual
arts may be less demanding to detect as opposed to literature because according to Elleström,
irony in film may be compared to irony in real life; that the representation of irony in film is
presented via speech, visual and aural elements, characters, actions, and situations. To write
about irony in film may be simply a variation of making ironic interpretations of more or less
ordinary lives that the viewers live. Furthermore, as it is noted by Booth, the interpretation of
an ironic statement depends on the knowledge of the speaker and the ‘nudges’ we, the
receivers, are presented with. However, in literature these nuances that surround the speaker
and the listener require much more elaborate inferences due to the lack of visual and aural
‘nudges’ with literature. As such one could argue that this theory also works the other way
around, meaning that the less elaborate it is to detect irony in film, the easier it might be to
cancel it. And I do believe that this is a method practiced in Epidemic where it is easier to
forgive the ironic distancing the film carries up to the last scene. But to further maintain this
belief, it seems essential to investigate Andersen’s claim that the ironic aura of Trier
transcends to a broader collection of his work. Through Andersen’s account the pervading
39
The Postironical
irony found in Trier’s earlier movies seems to cancel his attempts to employ a larger degree of
pathos in his later work, with the particular example of the film Breaking the Waves from
1996. Therefore, I seek to analyze this film in order to examine Andersen’s claim.
Breaking the Waves
This is the first film in Trier’s “Golden Heart Trilogy” from 1996, which also includes The
Idiots (1998) and Dancer in the Dark (2000). It becomes apparent that the story in Breaking
the Waves is very different from his previous Europa trilogy, where a Postmodern concept
has been replaced with a simple, almost banal story about a girl who sacrifices all she has for
the sake of love.
Narrative structure
The story revolves around Bess McNeill, who marries oil rig worker Jan despite objections
from her community, the Calvinist church. Bess is portrayed as a simple and childlike
woman, who has difficulties functioning without Jan when he is away on the oil rig. In an
attempt to bring Jan back, she prays to God and as a result Jan returns the next day but only
because he has suffered a serious head injury, which has left him paralyzed. Consequently,
Bess believes it is her fault and struggles to handle the situation. Jan, who is no longer able to
perform sexually nor mentally, urges Bess to find herself a lover whom she can tell him
about, as an attempt to experience their love for each other through Bess’ new encounters. As
a result, Bess starts living a promiscuous life and comes to believe that what she is doing is
the will of God and that her actions affect the outcome of Jan’s condition. As the story
progresses, Bess becomes more and more unstable, and begins to believe that her however
humiliating sexual encounters will eventually heal Jan. Tragically, Bess’ sacrifices end up
killing her and after her death, the viewer learns that Jan slowly starts to recover from his
injury.
A melodramatic story
This melodramatic story becomes a central theme in Trier’s Golden Heart Trilogy, which is a
title taken from the children’s book Guldhjerte – Eventyret om pigen der blev prinsesse. The
story in Guldhjerte is about a girl who is so good that she gives everything she owns away.
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The Postironical
“Jeg klarer mig nok” is her only respond as she gives away her food, her clothes and at the
end her heart. The story is an expression of the goodness and the ultimate consequence of
being a martyr, which in Breaking the Waves is combined with a religious and human motive
and a miracle. This simplistic story is combined with a melodramatic genre and attentiveness
to emotions as an effect in film. The aforementioned genre that the film appears to depict is
also substantiated by Torben Grodal, professor in film science, who states in Filmoplevelse
(2003) concerning the melodramatic genre,
“En stor gruppe filmhistorier benytter sig af kausale fremstillingsformer, der skildrer mennesker, der er underkastet en overvældende skæbne. Derved fremkalder disse historier ofte passive følelser som sorg og frygt, men de passive følelser kan også bestå i lidenskaber, dvs. følelser, der her en sådan styrke, at de bringer hovedpersonerne i konflikt med samfundet eller med de mere normale dele as deres karakter. Deres lidenskab er en kausal årsag, der sætter deres normale, viljestyrede dømmekraft ud af funktion.”59
The melodramatic genre often depicts characters who have a goal to achieve, which is
prevented by outside forces and this is where the genre often generates passive emotions such
as sorrow and fear. The characters’ actions in melodrama are therefore determined by outside
circumstances (e.g. war or natural disaster), and a possible way in which the audience deals
with this, is by expressing nervous twitches or by crying. The latter can be said to be the
body’s automatic reaction of the emotion of powerlessness. Furthermore, a melodramatic film
can maintain this emotion through its narrative structure and its style which emphasizes the
characters affection by using close-ups of facial expressions and applying mood setting music
that reinforces both empathy and allegiance. By applying passionate emotions, drama and a
polarized world view, the melodramatic genre has functioned well in audiovisual art such as
film where the expressive dramatic form could be supplied with a use of excessive emotional
background music.
In the 1930s and 40s this was a common sought out genre and movies like Gone With the
Wind (1939) and Casablanca (1942) displayed these melodramatic aspects. In Breaking the
Waves Bess is also the victim of a devastating destiny and the audience experience the fear
and sorrow she goes through. Furthermore, we see how she is controlled by her emotions and
how this affects her judgment. An example of this can be found near the end of the film where
Bess, in a last attempt to ‘heal’ Jan, puts her own life at risk with fatal consequences. She
willingly offers herself to a couple of sailors who she already knows would try to rape and kill
59 Grodal, Torben. Filmoplevelse – en indføring i audiovisuel teori og analyse. 2003 p 199
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The Postironical
her. Prior to this, we see her first encounter with them and how she barely manages to escape
from the ship that they are on. As such, Andersen is right in claiming that a larger level of
pathos is employed in this film as opposed to Epidemic. However, when looking at the history
of melodramatic films, it becomes clear that Breaking the Waves does differ in some aspects.
Through the narrative structure of Breaking the Waves it is also observed that compared to
Epidemic, it employs a larger degree of redundancy and the characters’ actions are well
motivated. The protagonist Bess is depicted as a happy and cheerful woman and as such she
becomes the person that the viewer commits to and engaged in. Through the story’s
alignment, the viewer is presented with Bess’ motivations and moral codes which the
audience can identify with. Bess’ only wish is to be married to Jan and live a happy life
together, a notion we can all sympathize with and therefore an allegiance is established
between us and Bess. This is further emphasized as both the community and her family are
skeptic of the marriage and look censorious at Bess. The larger degree of redundancy is seen
through the depiction of Jan’s friends and the elderly men of the Calvinist church. The film
often shows how Jan and his friends from the oil rig joke and laugh together which stands in
clear contrast to the people of Bess’ community, who is never seen expressing any form of
joy. As such the film bears resemblance to a mainstream narrative structure within the genre
of melodrama. This is also substantiated by the plot’s unlimited narration where as mentioned
earlier the viewer is assigned with more knowledge than the characters. Within this, it is also
worth noting Rose/Christansen’s statement concerning the depth of knowledge that the viewer
is presented with. It is a notion of how deep the plot gives us access to the characters’ mental
state. In a movie where only the characters’ external behavior are described, then we are
dealing with an objective narration. If we however, are assigned with camera shots from the
character’s optical view, then we dealing with perceptual subjectivity, and if we are further
involved in a person’s dreams and memories, we call this mental subjectivity.60 In Breaking
the Waves, the viewer is presented with more knowledge than Bess and this gives us the
opportunity to predict the outcome of her actions and it reinforces our allegiance to Bess,
which applies to the genre of melodrama.
By applying the same analytic method as exercised in Epidemic, it becomes apparent that
Breaking the Waves differs noticeably through its narrative as well as stylistic structure.
Where Epidemic explored a self-conscious and in many respects experimental idea of the 60 Rose/Christiansen. p 150
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The Postironical
relationship between fiction and reality, Breaking the Waves practices a much more common
theme of tragic love. In terms of narrative structure, it becomes apparent that the film employs
a higher degree of redundancy, where Epidemic for the most part neglected that.
Stylistic structure and display of similarities
While the two films take separate routes within themes, they do however share some
similarities on a number of levels. To support this notion, you only have to look at the very
first scene of Breaking the Waves. The first image that the audience is presented with is the
title of the movie, which is projected on top of Lars Von Trier’s own name written with large
transparent and white capital letters where the title is smaller and written in black. Here, the
audience notices that the title sequence is shot with a handheld camera, which gives an
unsteady and rough experience. In the next frame, the film jumps to a close-up of Bess who is
being questioned by the local priest and elderly council, because she despite the council’s
objections wants to marry Jan who they see as an outsider. As before the camera is again
handheld and moves back and forth between the characters in quick jerks. This form of
stylistic structure has a documentary effect which becomes a contrast of the scene’s narrative
content.
The scene expresses a discomforting silence and condemnation of Bess’ wish to marry the
outsider, which is seen through close-ups of the council’s ominous faces and Bess’ naive
look. What is further seen through the stylistic structure is the notion of the film’s artistic
depiction. Breaking the Waves is with its stylistic chapter frames, grainy images, shaking
camera and breach of continuity cutting, a film which emphasizes the style more than a
traditional progressive story. The style of documentary is also further established through the
film’s fadeless colors and socially realistic scenography. As such the film connects an evident
fictitious situation with a paradoxical marked reality effect. This again is further emphasized
in the next scene where Bess has gone outside. The camera films a close-up of her profile
when she suddenly looks straight into the camera and thereby the audience, with a playful
smile. In film this is often seen as a ‘violation’ of the rules where the character seems to
become aware of the fictive narrative, and the occurrence creates a moment of surprise and
relocates the character’s position and status. Thus, Bess’ look into the camera becomes a
direct reference to the audience and this reference invokes a consciousness of the aspect to
observe and being observed. On the basis of this, Breaking the Waves presents its ambiguous
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The Postironical
strategy within the two first minutes of the film and encourages the audience to see the movie
as something different from what it seemingly pretends to be. The film stresses its premises
and metafictive nature in its prelude and as such the film does not state certainty of a classical
representation nor a realistic story.
Another similarity found between Breaking the Waves and Epidemic, is Trier’s use of
chapters. The story of Bess is divided into eight chapters and each of them is depicted through
digitally manipulated panoramic single shots of various Scottish landscapes accompanied by
American and British popular rock music from the 1960s and 70s. On the surface, the use of
the panoramic images functions as chapter divisions that create a down-to-earth outline of the
story’s logic. The significance of these chapter cut-scenes stands in support of the films
indefinite narrative and further expectation of the audience. An example of this is seen with
the depiction of chapter one: “Bess Gets Married”, which interrupts and breaks off the
aforementioned scene with Bess’ look into the camera. This chapter frame denotes a deep
contrast with the film’s stylistic structure which so far has portrayed a silent and slow
narrative composition. As mentioned the camera in these frames is stationary and furthermore
the colors are more lively and vivid compared to the previous scenes. The song All the Way
from Memphis (1973) by Mott the Hopple is played, as background music, during this chapter
and is in respect a fast paced and ‘loud’ track indicating an all together opposing narrative
structure compared to the previous scene. Furthermore, it plays with the audience’s
expectations and promotes a more typical mainstream composition. This is substantiated by
Rose/Christiansen;
Underlægningsmusikken er et væsentligt narrativt stemningsskabende virkemiddel. Et af de mest karakteristiske elementer i den narrative brug af filmmusik er ledemotivet, hvor et musiktema følger en person, eller en situations stemning som fx kærlighedstemaet i Titanic eller spænding og anspændthed som i Taxi Driver.61
However, in Breaking the Waves, while the music suggests the film’s more energetic ‘mood’,
the following scene cancels this as the audience is brought back to the handheld camera’s
fadeless colors and the story’s slow pace. As the viewer realizes, this is the case in all of the
eight chapter frames, where the stylistic composition denotes mainstream film effects only to
be continuously disrupted by the narrative pace of the film. In addition to the background
music applied in the chapter scenes, it is also used at a certain point in the story, where Jan is
61 Rose / Christiansen. p 174
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The Postironical
brought home from the hospital to live with Bess in his new vegetated state. This is depicted
through a montage of cut-scenes and is again accompanied by music. In the instance before
this montage, the viewer sees Bess at the hospital talking to Jan’s doctor, who tries to comfort
her. Bess who believes it is her fault that Jan is paralyzed starts crying, but the doctor takes
her hands, looks at her and smiles, “Come on. Things will pick up, once he gets home
again.”62 Here, the film cuts to the montage and the song Hot Love (1971) by T. Rex starts to
play. Again a mood setting is established as the viewer sees Bess and her sister bringing Jan
home while they smile and laugh. We see Jan’s friends on the oil rig, who are also in a
cheerful mood because they seem to have found oil.
A self-conscious double strategy
The interesting aspect of this is Trier’s use of a typical mainstream sequence composition
which is an element usually criticized by him and stands in contrast to the film’s overall
structure. However, while the montage depicts common mainstream characteristics, it is at the
same time also incorporating metafictive elements which are established through instances in
the montage where Bess again looks into the camera. Furthermore, the montage and the
chapter frames can be argued to have cathartic significance and function as an emotional
break from Bess’ tragic story. No matter what, the elements mentioned here do point towards
a double strategy within Breaking the Waves’ narrative and stylistic structure. As said before
the film depicts a seemingly straightforward melodramatic story, but at the same time it
portrays elements of metafictive nature. In the traditional melodramatic genre a classic
mainstream composition is usually followed, where camera movements, cut-scenes and
background music create the viewer’s optimal experience and identification with a film.
Conversely, Breaking the Waves displays at the same time metafictive elements as seen when
Bess looks into the camera. According to Torben Grodal this aspect presents problems within
a film,
Ved at understrege den intellektuelle afstand til fiktionen blokeres samtidig tilskuerens allegiance og identifikation af diegesens personer. (…) Oplevelsen af meta-fiktionelle planer er dog, som omtalt i kapitel 3, besværet af den menneskelige oplevelsesevnes kapacitet. Det kan ofte i praksis være vanskeligt at opleve distancen, fordi en sådan distance kræver, at vi både har aktiveret et tilskuervindue og et diegesevindue i vores bevidsthed.63
62 Breaking the waves. t 01:07:1663 Grodal, Torben. p. 207
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This breaks the illusion and diminishes the audiences’ participation in the fictional events. As
a result, it would therefore be seemingly difficult to employ both distance and empathy within
the same film without one of them cancelling the other since both are of opposing nature.
However, I do believe Breaking the Waves successfully achieves this double strategy without
cancelling the movie’s emotional appeal. From reviewing the film, it becomes clear that a
much larger degree of pathos is employed which at the same time dominates the story and
leaves the metafictive and ironic elements as secondary considerations. To further substantiate
this claim one could argue that the practice of double strategy is a product of a postmodern
condition. As mentioned earlier in the section concerning the basis of movement, Michael
Rasmussen stated that an essential part of postmodern thinking confides in the revolt against
grand narratives and remains suspicious of any single foundation and ultimate position of
truth. In this sense, we alienate the idea of an established future-perspective and are left with
task of creating our own. Therefore, our way of Postmodern thinking demands us to be
creative and rational at the same time and in comparison, this is an aspect practiced in
Breaking the Waves which is being creative with its mixture of opposing elements but at the
same time rational with the film’s story and perception.
The last scene
Perhaps the most interesting aspect in Breaking the Waves in regards to the theory of the
Postironical, is the last scene. After Bess’ death Jan recovers from his injury and wants to give
Bess an honorable funeral, which he does not believe that the church can give her. Therefore,
along with his friends, Jan steals Bess’ body from the mortuary and takes it out to the oil rig
and gives Bess a worthy burial in waves of the ocean. The next day Jan is woken by one of
his friends, who wants to show him something, in his own words unbelievable. He is taken to
the rig’s radar which does not detect anything and Jan questions his friend’s intention. But as
they step outside on the rig’s platform, they hear the sound of church bells ringing which
seems to come from the sky and Jan starts to cry cheerfully. The film cuts to a shot of the oil
rig from above and the viewer sees church bells swinging over the clouds as the scene fades to
black and the film’s credits starts. While the credits roll across the screen, scenes from the
movie are also shown to maintain the viewer’s recollection of the story.
The final scene of Breaking the Waves is perhaps the most widely discussed subject critiqued
by audiences and critics. Where some found the ending to be beautiful and serious and in keep
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The Postironical
with real miracle depicted by Jan’s recovery, others saw it as tasteless, ironic and an
annulment of the preceding story. As such it is also a pivotal issue in Andersen’s theory on
the Postironical where the main problem revolves around Breaking the Waves’ last scene. Are
the church bells meant to be ironic, and if so do they cancel the pathos established and
experienced by the audience? I do not believe that they are meant to be ironic but I can see
how they can be perceived as such or perhaps if not ironic, then at least forcedly pathetic. This
problem however, compares to the film’s overall narrative composition which also portrays a
combination of empathy and distance. However, if the church bells are an ironic comment
made by Trier, it is still not substantial enough to revoke the melodramatic composition of the
entire film. As seen in Epidemic, the notion of Booth also applies in Breaking the Waves as he
states that irony can be perceived as a local and temporary effect that only communicates a
specific message and does not destabilize the whole work. Still Andersen’s claim goes beyond
the discussion of only one work and he bases his statement as an argument that should be
considered within a variety of Trier’s films – that the supposed irony perceived in Breaking
the Waves’ last scene is established by his previous ironical and metafictive films such as
Epidemic. As I said earlier, the two films mentioned here do not fall under the same category;
This is argued through Epidemic’s ironic distancing and experimental structure where
Breaking the Waves relies more on a melodramatic story and applies a much larger degree of
pathos.
Key findings
Through the narrative structure of the film, it becomes apparent that it portrays a
melodramatic story but Trier has created a story that through its stylistic system concentrates
on a more serious and raw environment. The mentioned classic characteristics of the
melodramatic genre are in Breaking the Waves turned into a functional frame in which Trier
constructs a realistic emotionality that the classic genre lacks. While the film employs classic
Hollywood characteristics such as redundancy, motivation and allegiance, it does at the same
time incorporate elements of metafictive narratives which counter the melodramatic genre.
Through his employment of metafictive aspects combined with typical mainstream
characteristics, Trier manages to create a film that establishes the possibility of using several
opposing elements and as such the movie can be seen as a successful result of Epidemic’s
revolt against the System. The supposed irony argued by Andersen in connection to the
Postironical, is also refuted as it does not cancel the pathos in the film. As a result, the larger
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The Postironical
level of pathos in Breaking the Waves does not determine a complete break with Trier’s
previous ironical phase and should instead be seen as a successful product of Epidemic’s
experimental composition. What is also interesting about Andersen’s statement of Trier,
where he claims that Trier has a difficulties being taken seriously when appealing to our
emotions. As I have already established the supposed does not cancel the pathos of the rest of
the movie based on Booth’s theory on localized irony. As such I accept the argument that the
church bells in Breaking the Waves can be perceived to be ironic. The notion of this then, can
be seen as an reflection of Trier’s own belief, that he does not wish his films to be taken too
seriously. With this I suggest, while Trier supposedly removes some emotional appeal
through ironic distance in Breaking the Waves, he is commenting on that specific film and
does not imply a complete denunciation of being a serious director.
Comparison
By combining the findings of Epidemic and Breaking the Waves shows through a
Neoformalistic analysis, how both movies differ from each other within the narrative
structure, but do have similar traits in connection with the stylistic structure. Noticeably, they
both practice an aspect of metafictive, where the use of handheld camera supports this notion.
However, as the analysis demonstrated, the significance of meta effects had different meaning
between the two films. Epidemic applied these effects with an agenda to thematize the relation
between fiction and reality. Additionally, the effects also helped to establish Trier’s criticism
of the film industry, where he through ironic distance is able to attain a criticizing position.
The film’s clear lack of redundancy, motivation and alignment are all elements that show how
Trier dissociates Epidemic from mainstream film. In Breaking the Waves Trier also apply
metafictive aspect, but as the analysis proved, these effects were employed together with
classic elements of the mainstream. As such, the film takes notice of a double strategy, which
notes a problematic perception of the movie. However, Breaking the Waves manages to
incorporate both strategies without cancelling the degree of pathos and thereby stating Trier’s
opinion on recognized and accepted storytelling in film. Finally, the analysis depicted how
both films can be considered in connection with Andersen’s theory of the Postironical. As
mentioned, Epidemic marked clear characteristics of a Postmodern film which supports the
notion of the Postironical because as Andersen stated, it does not represent a clean break with
Postmodernism, but is rather a revised continuation, which is simultaneously a break and a
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The Postironical
extension, and as such the Postironical is by and large related to Postmodernism. Breaking the
Waves also showed signs of a Postironical film, but to a minor degree than Epidemic. Thus,
Breaking the Waves should be seen as a successful result of Epidemic, and as a continued
example of Trier’s mode of expression. From this, I argue that Trier in deed can be seen as a
Postironist based on the analysis of the two films mentioned here. However, I deem it
necessary to question Andersen in his theory of new Postmodern tendencies, which points
toward a redefined perception of irony and as such becomes Postirony.
Perspective of Andersen’s theory
Tore Rye Andersen’s theory of the Postironical does seem to have legitimate arguments and a
basis for a new movement may be in its beginning phase. Furthermore, Andersen is not alone
in his contemplation of postmodern irony. Among others Linda Hutcheon also sees the
problems that exist within the politics of irony. However, Andersen is the only one to coin the
term the Postironical to the common traits in Postmodern literature, which he bases his theory
on.
In Irony’s Edge, Hutcheon notes the danger of being misunderstood when we in the Western
world try to use irony as a critical weapon against certain establishments. When the Western
world decides to be ironic about itself, it cannot avoid some relation to its others. Hutcheon
gives an example of this, where she details a visit at a Canadian museum, which, instead of
presenting its archives from other dominated cultures from the point of view of knowledge
and authority, decided to adopt an ironic view point.64 One image showed a white woman
educating the indigenous population in the art of hygiene and was presented and labeled as
such, with the viewer supposedly being able to spot the patronizing tone both of the image
and its description. However, this decision to present the colonizing gaze ironically, failed to
achieve its aim, where many of the indigenous viewers of the exhibition saw the images as a
presentation of the white Western view of its others. As such Hutcheon believes that irony is
not and should not be a disbelief or distance from what one says, but that irony has a political
and ethical force. In this sense, speaking the language of colonialism and reason ironically
should be in order to display its violence, force and delimited viewpoint. However, this 64 Hutcheon, Linda. Irony’s Edge – The theory and politics of irony. 1994 p 178
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The Postironical
critical repetition does not only risk being unnoticed or misunderstood, because it still allows
the voice of colonialism to speak. Hutcheon cannot seem to reach a conclusion on this issue,
which English professor Claire Colebrook also notes in her book Irony (2004),
On one hand she maintains the value of irony in creating a distance from Western discourses and narratives of reason. It is precisely because, from a position of postmodern postcolonialism, one cannot find or desire a better position of truth and authority, that one adopts irony to present any authority or history as one fiction among others. On the other hand, not only can such gestures of distancing and irony fail to be read, they also allow the West to keep speaking itself, even if one with a full sense of violence and limits of one’s context.65
In this sense, Hutcheon and Claire also see the paradoxical problem that exists within the
concept of Postmodern irony. Like Andersen, they note that the employment of irony in
Western culture has the issue of being misread. Furthermore, Colebrook’s theory also seems
to support Andersen’s notion of irony’s loss of critical value and that mainstream culture has
made it a norm in itself. Colebrook writes how Postmodern novels and films such as Bret
Easton Ellis’s American Psycho (1991) and Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs (1992),
display a system of signs, clichés, slogans and advertising slogans. They both present the
dismemberment of bodies alongside the enjoyed and popular signs of everyday life and as
such the violence can be read, not as a local perversion or evil, but as a symptomatic of a
world where the immediacy and surface nature of desire and gratification precludes any moral
voice or limit. In this way Colebrook states, that one could read such works as ironic critiques
of the world they present, but this would requires an explicit reading. Therefore Colebrook
states,
Even if we were to decide that such works were ironic, how do we avoid the enjoyment, repetition and reinforcement of violence that these texts also make possible? If masculinity, or Western ‘phallogocentrism’ that can acknowledge no limits to its own desire and self-projection, is being repeatedly ironised as self-consuming, irony may be one way for this subject of domination to sustain itself.66
As noted in the theory section, Andersen used the film Pulp Fiction as an example of
mainstream culture’s employment of irony, and within this he described it through Jameson’s
notion of blank irony – that the irony in a movie like Pulp Fiction does not serve a visible
purpose besides maintaining the shiny facades of the characters. On the basis of this, irony is
seen a directionless which is not committed to anything but a sly grin and has lost all
oppositional force. As such Andersen and Colebrook disagrees on irony’s purpose within
65 Colebrook, Claire. Irony. 2004 p 16066 Colebrook. p 158
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The Postironical
these movies, where Andersen sees the irony as a way of maintaining the characters’ shallow
personalities, Colebrook sees it as method to sustain self-projected masculinity. But
interestingly enough, they both come to the conclusion that the irony contained in these films
does not claim any form of critical value.
However, there are a number of aspects that question Andersen’s notion and shake the ground
on which he stands. From reviewing the characteristics Andersen notes on the Postironical
themes, it becomes clear that one of them creates a paradox within his own argument. As
mentioned, Andersen states that there is a focus on near things such as family and the personal
which is not synonymous with the desertion of political awareness in favor of self-centered
contemplation.
Andersen claims that there has been a slight adjustment of Postmodernism, so that the
political is now presented through the personal rather than vice versa. In Postmodernism we
are often presented as slaves of the System, whereas the Postironical seems to be increasingly
aware of that we in fact constitute the System and that our role as victims tends to be caused
by our own free choices. What is interesting here is Andersen’s assumption that this aspect is
only as he calls it a “slight adjustment” from Postmodernism to the Postironical. However, I
see this notion as a rather considerable adjustment, which stands in contrast with the supposed
new movement’s predecessor. If Andersen is right, then there is no longer anyone to blame
but ourselves and as such the revolt against mainstream culture becomes in reality a revolt
against our own consciousness. Furthermore, this aspect also creates a paradox within
Andersen’s argument concerning the most pivotal point of the Postironical basis. The main
argument in Andersen’s theory is David Foster Wallace’s critique of mainstream culture’s
directionless use and transformation of irony, which in the sixties stood as a healthy and
critical reaction against the System. This is where the paradox occurs, because if we in a
Postironical fashion accept the fact that we constitute the System, then criticizing this
establishment implies that we are reacting against ourselves, and therefore the loss of irony as
a critical weapon seems justified since it would otherwise contradict the argument.
What is furthermore interesting about Andersen’s theory is his comment on the problem he
sees American writers are faced with. According to him, the main problem is how the
commercial culture increasingly encroaches upon the writers’ territory, and thereby rendering
their art toothless. Here, Andersen uses the American author Don DeLillo as an example of
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The Postironical
this, who by his account has attempted to stay out of the commercial loop and maintain a
marginal position in the society he criticizes in his novels. By staying on the edge of the
System, it is possible to undertake a number of critical attacks against the System without
becoming a part of it. Andersen’s states that DeLillo rarely gives interviews and he at one
point in his life moved to Greece in order to stay out of the commercial market. But with the
publication of the bestseller White Noise (1985), it became increasingly difficult for DeLillo
to keep the attention at bay, and when he published Underworld in 1997, he was transformed
into a literary superstar. This resulted in the previously silent and invisible writer going on a
number of promotion tours and giving a series of interviews. Nevertheless, the media and the
critics are still trying to construct DeLillo as a marginal, rebellious figure in the midst of
mainstream culture. Conversely, this aspect also seems to presents a form paradox within
Andersen’s argument. If the goal of a Postmodernist is point out the problems that exist with
the establishment, it will also be reasonable to expect that people should be made aware of
this in order to resolve these problems. But if it is only possible to criticize the System by
staying out of the commercial loop, then it would seemingly be impossible to be heard.
Conclusion
Based on my analysis, I am now able to answer my thesis’ problem statement, which set out
to explore how and if Lars von Trier, who by Andersen’s claim, portray Postironical traits. I
do believe that Tore Rye Andersen is justified in his claim that Lars von Trier does show
traits of the Postironical in connection to the films analyzed in this thesis. Even though Trier
explores two different themes, there still seems to be a common aspect present in both of
them. They both diverge from the typical mainstream film and try to incorporate a
combination of different opposing narrative and stylistic structures. Epidemic can be seen as
an experimental film which explores the diverse aspect of film and is more a direct critique of
mainstream movies. Based on my analysis, I argue that Epidemic is more than anything a
statement by Trier that a film can be made without following a certain set of approved or
recognized rules. Breaking the Waves can be seen as a result of Epidemic’s statement, where
Trier manages to incorporate metafictive and ironic aspects in a melodramatic film without
cancelling the pathos and as such Trier successfully proves his point. What also becomes
apparent is Trier’s position within the concept of the Postironical, where he stands out among
his colleagues as the only director who effectively achieves his goals. On the basis of this, I
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The Postironical
also argue that Andersen is wrong in his claim that Trier struggles to be taken seriously in his
attempt to employ a larger degree of pathos in his work.
It seems that Trier is fully aware of the fact that in order to be critical of the film industry, he
has to maintain a marginal position because, as mentioned, in order to stay critical of the
System it is important not to be a part of it. One could argue that Trier can be compared with
Don DeLillo who by Andersen’s account deals with the same problem. In comparison Trier is
also notoriously known for his reluctance to give interviews and as a result of this reporters
and critics are often left with their own opinion of his work. Furthermore, Trier who on the
success of Dogme 95 suddenly gave interviews – although the number of interviews was
limited, it still became noticeable due to his previous total silence in the media. However, the
comparison between the two does not seem to end here because Andersen notes how the
effect of commercial success has influenced DeLillo. Moreover, Trier’s latest film Antichrist
from 2009 showed Trier as the most interesting director at the Cannes Film Festival where
many critics and reporters gathered to interview him at the press conference. This aspect may
argue that Trier has passed his position as a Postironist and has now moved on to seek new
ground. However, I would claim that Trier still attempts to preserve his position as a marginal
director. Antichrist which received a lot of attention on its release contains elements to
support my claim. While some critics praised the film for its stunning stylistic structure and
sinister depiction of human grief, others saw it as a disgusting and mindless provocation
without any value. The depictions of molesting both male and female genitalia are some of
the elements that created such strong reactions to the film. By having these images, Trier
manages to avoid mainstream culture’s acceptance and keep his role as a rebellious figure
who continues to stay critical of the System. Furthermore, in terms of irony Trier still
employs its practice in his recent film, which points to the notion of an auteur trademark and
therefore is a characteristic which among others defines Trier’s creative visions. On a final
note, the ironic aura, Andersen claims Trier to have, is thus also a perception I agree with.
However, where Andersen sees it as a problematic characteristic that impedes Trier’s ability
to maintain his position as a rebellious director; I find the ironic distancing to be a part of his
persona which supports his position as a Postironist.
In a perspective view, the concept of irony in a Postmodern context denotes an interesting
aspect in the world today. As noted in the introduction we use irony on a daily basis and as
such our employment of this rhetorical mode must be presumed to have a significant role in
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The Postironical
our society. However, as Andersen points out irony seems to have changed from a position of
being critical of the System to an empty and powerless norm in itself. It is certainly true that
within the mainstream culture of television, talks-shows, sitcoms and other comical programs
employ a great deal of irony as a method of distancing themselves from the subject, which
they ridicule. However, as Booth mentions, this may only have temporary effect and therefore
it does not create any worthy significance in taking a critical position. How can irony be
viewed as a weapon to expose the hypocrisy of Western society when it is distancing itself
from what is being criticized. In this perspective it demands the interpreter of the statement to
recognize the unsaid meaning and thus irony has a potential chance of being misunderstood.
In this sense, I question the argument if irony should even be used as way of criticizing
anything when it has an ambiguous and self-conscious demeanor. This aspect also presents a
paradoxical notion of the fact that I become self-conscious when analyzing and criticizing the
subject of my thesis. As such it is interesting to consider Andersen’s notion of being critical
of the System. I do believe that the Postmodern thinking is changing from a criticizing view
of society and the conservative establishment, to a realization of our own involvement in the
construction of the System which we urge to blame. In this perspective I argue that irony can
be viewed as a healthy device to help us recognize this because irony creates distance, which
gives us the opportunity to see society from another point of view.
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