The Danish Girl is a beautiful thought provoking film. It tells
the story of Einar and Gerda Wegener, artists in Copenhagen in 1926. Einar is a successful
landscape artist and Gerda paints portraits but has not reaped the same success
as her husband due to the sexism of the art establishment. One day when a model
can’t make a sitting for Gerda she asks her husband to put on some ladies
tights and shoes so she can still paint. This awakes a new identity in Einar
which is later christened Lili. At first Lili is an eccentric persona for
parties but soon becomes more, Einar longs to be Lili in body as well as soul
and so begins his transgender journey and Gerda’s to the loss her husband in exchange
for a friend.
The film is beautifully shot and the costumes, hair and make-up
echo the deco and nouveau styles however it is the chic, delectable,
gorgeousness of the production that makes the harrowing unhappy story all the
more moving. The prettiness reinforces the feeling of dissatisfaction; captured
in the painterly landscape of flowing silk chiffon gowns and scarf's Lili is a façade,
she can never be accepted as a real woman in 1920’s society
The story is made more powerful by it being a story of two
halves; Redmayne has the more dramatic
transition from man to woman however its Gerda’s
independent frame of mind and
unconditional love for her husband that gives the film great power. Unlike in ‘A
Theory of Everything where Felicity Jones’s Jane Hawking coped with Eddie Redmayne’s
Stephen Hawking debilitating physical condition In ‘The Danish Girl’ Einar’s
choice is his alone; it is a mental decision as well as a physical one. It would
have been easy for Gerda to walk away but because she chooses to support him it
provides an interesting comment on the complexities of love and relationships.
Yes she loses her husband but there is still a love between them both even
after the transition.
There were times I found it hard to rationalise Einar’s
point of view. In many ways he was very selfish, destroying his marriage and
breaking Gerda’s heart all because he wanted to be a woman. I suppose it is
something you can only understand if you are Trans. I felt the film was realistic
in how it managed to show Einar’s need to undergo this journey but also the
destruction and heartbreak it caused on both sides of the marriage.
It is a harrowing emotional ride, how could it not be?
Despite there is light and shade, much like their art, their emotions are
portrayed with believability and realism. You can see Einar’s conflicting
emotions as he explains Lili is more than a bit of fun or Gerda’s love for
Einar but frustration that he can’t forgo Lili for her sake.
The use of costume is subtly effective in visually
communicating Einar’s transition to Lili. From her first outing, which has a
look of ‘a man in a dress’ feel about it: you can tell Lili hasn’t come to the
forefront yet; to one of the most successful costumes when Einar/Lili is
beaten up in a Parisian park in the last quarter of the movie. Dressed in a
cream suit and feminine style shirt with his natural hair but by this time in a
far more feminine style than at the start of the film and wearing makeup, this
look I felt was completely androgynous: it was feminine but also masculine. It
came across as genderless falling in the no man’s land of the gender binary. As
a study of how clothing creates an identity this is a fascinating construction,
one of the most powerful uses of costume in a film for a long time.
This is a film that will stay with you after the final scene
and will make you question the boundaries of love, gender, sex and identity. It
is a highly emotive, turbulent story of identity and how far you would go to
support the one you love. The only question left to answer is who is the ‘Danish
Girl’ Gerda or Lili? I reckon it could be both.
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