Sydney Film Festival 2025 - Sentimental Value

 

“The house got lighter and lighter.”

Poignant, playful but deeply pained, Sentimental Value is a quietly heart wrenching exploration of generational loss and estrangement with absolutely incredible performances from Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, & Elle Fanning that finds healing through a deftly layered screenplay and appreciation for the catharsis of art. 

Discussion Points:

Joachim Trier’s follow-up to The Worst Person in the World reunites him with Renate Reinsve (and Anders Danielsen Lie in a smaller role) as she plays a stage actress Nora estranged from her film director father Gustav, played by Stellan Skarsgård. She and her sister Agnes, played by Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas are tightly woven together, but the loss of their mother, brings them back into contact with their dad who’s latest work he wants Agnes to star in. When she declines, he ends up casting American actress Rachel Kemp played by Elle Fanning. What follows is a deeply personal and intimately woven story of generational loss. Joachim Trier sets much of the film around the family home in Norway which has been passed down through the generations. The house is an anthropomorphised character in itself, given thoughts and feelings and history and memory by Nora as she ponders if the home misses certain occupants, remembers certain pains and enjoys certain celebrations. Trier’s screenplay similarly has this deep connection to family and the complex relationships that develop between broken people bonded by blood. The entire cast sparks with vibrant energy but deep emotion. The film naturally ebbs from comedic joys to depressive lows in a raw exploration of identity, responsibility and legacy. And its appreciation for the arts as a means to express that which has been repressed and reconnect with that which has been lost or long forgotten is a great cinematic affirmation. Honestly, a near perfectly executed film that’s raw, real and rather outstanding that left me wholly moved by its tender genius sentimentality.