There is a character in the film Sentimental Value that is an object. A House actually. A house with a deep flaw. A crack that runs right through the house. It is a house in Norway. But the crack is important. Nora Borg (Renate Reinsve) lived in the house. The director of the play goes to coax the nervous Nora to come and perform. He assurers her she knows her lines. Like the house she is damaged. But she is too scared to go on stage until the director persuades her to come to the theatre. Nora is backstage but too nervous to go on.  At Nora’s request a backstage staff person slaps her. It does not help. Finally, she runs away, too stressed to perform, but staff run after her. The audience is restless. Nora says she is ready. She goes on stage. She looks terrified. No one knows what she will do. There is a long moment of very awkward silence. Nora performs brilliantly and the audience gives her a standing ovation at the end. Art cures all.  End of story. Right?  Not quite.

 

 

Agnes Borg Petersen (Inga Ibsdott)  is the sister to Nora Borg. Their father Gustav Borg ((Stellan Skarsgård) a film director shows up and wonders why the funeral of their mother was in a church.  Did his wife find religion before her death? No, the children just thought it would be nice. A dead parent and religion. Now we are clearly in the realm of Swedish cinema. But this is Norway. Aren’t things more sunny in Norway? Sometimes.

 

The father tells his daughters that their mother was “as sharp as hell.”  How sharp can that be? And she was beautiful like her daughters. And “she was always right.” Perhaps that is the first crack in the house. Just like a wife to be right all the time. Right?

 

Gustav is a film maker. Is he God? If this was a Bergman film he would be God. He shows Nora a play he has written for her. He wants her to be the lead? The film will be made in their old house. She won’t accept the role, she says, because her father and her can’t even communicate.  How would it work if he tried to direct her? She won’t even read the screenplay. She wants no part of it.

 

 

Rachel Kemp is an American  actress who says she will play in the film, but at the last minute backs out. She said, “praying isn’t really like talking to God. It’s acknowledging the despair.”  Things are too weird for her after all.

 

The father and two daughters own the house with a crack, but no one can afford to buy the others out. So it will have to be sold.  Agnes who is occupying the house, tells Nora she can have anything she wants from the house. There are many things in the house with sentimental value. Nora wants nothing. Nothing has sentimental value for her.

 

The Mother was imprisoned for 2 years during the war. Gustav used to say, “There is nothing more beautiful than shadows.”  And he imagined his childhood home filled with shadows. Like Swedish film makers he seems to be allergic to the light.

 

Gustav’s wife was Sissel who was a therapist and mother of Nora and Agnes, but they had many fights.  After the divorce Gustav moved out. Then the house grew lighter and lighter.”

 

 

Gustav and his daughters argue at a party while he is making his film he wrote for Nora.  He suggests she should have children because his 2 daughters were the best thing ever in his life. Nora asks why wasn’t he around then? She has obvious resentments about her father and his chasing actresses around and disconnection from his daughters. He tells them, “It’s hard to love someone who’s so full of rage. It’s not good for the art either.” He also thinks she is wasting her time playing roles written centuries ago. So, he puts her down. A hard way to get love. But fathers do that sometimes. Like so many films I saw this year, he too might have irrational goals. He seems obsessed with art.

 

 

The father also wants his grandson to be in the film but Agnes does not want her son to be a part of it. She stood up to her father and was proud of that, but then she read the script and realized it was great. Gustav sits in the rain and gives the finger to God. So it seems to me at least That’s what characters do Swedish films. Maybe Norway is like that too.

 

 

Agnes wants her sister Nora to read screenplay because the  story is about her. After a lot of coaxing from her sister, she reads the film script and realizes it is good.

 

I think the film is really about art. This is a very artistic and dysfunctional family. Cracked like their house. But, surprisingly the film script wakes them up so they see each other for the first time.

 

Nora realizes, that maybe, just maybe, for the first time her father saw her. And she saw him.  That is what art can do. It can open the heart. Art can help us see.

 

The art also helped Agnes and Nora to see each other for the first time. Nora realizes that Agnes created a family and a home, while she, Nora was screwed up.  Agnes explains to Nora that the one difference in their being brought up was that Agnes had Nora her older sister who helped her and cared about her. Nora though had no one. Nora thought she was always selfish and alone but Agnes tells her she was a big help for her. And now thanks to the art they can see each other too. That is what art does. It helps us to see the world as human. As something we are a part of. Even a cracked-up family can benefit from art.

 

There is a brilliant scene at the end that I do not want to give away. All I will say is that I wondered if was real or is it part of the film. You decide.