Customer Ratings & Reviews

As in writer/director Lars von Trier's 2004 "Dogville," everything in this sequel takes place on a warehouse-size, nearly bare performance space with only minimal set elements, limbo-darkness beyond the illuminated areas, and locations designated map-style by words painted on the floor. And like "Dogville," it still manages to be fascinating and absolutely engrossing. This is part two of von Trier's trilogy of films that began with "Dogville." Bryce Dallas Howard takes over the role of Grace, played by Nicole Kidman last time around. Howard does a good job of embodying a more crusading and "take-charge" Grace, a wised-up version of Kidman's character. The time period is the 1930s. Grace, her father (played here by Willem Dafoe) and his henchmen have left Dogville and ended up at a southern plantation where slavery never ended. Grace tells her father to leave her and two of his men there, where they reverse the roles of the plantation's whites and blacks. Don't go expecting a predictable "lesson" movie about equality and social justice, though. The movie has enough twists and turns to offend both the Klan and the NAACP by the time the credits roll. As outrageous as "Dogville" was, "Manderlay" takes place in an even stranger reality. It's at heart a fairly simple morality fable gone very wrong, a world where even the best of intentions by those who don't know the full story can end up causing more harm than good. And man, is it ever interesting. Highly recommended!