The more and more I thought about Midsommar the more I believed I love it more than Ari Aster's previous and equally disturbing Hereditary. I enjoyed Hereditary as a horror movie more than I did Midsommar when I had initially saw it, but I think Midsommar has a lot more going in with it's messages about (unhealthy) relationships.
To summarize, Midsommar follows Dani, a young woman traumatized after the her younger sister commits a murder-suicide against their parents, and her neglectful boyfriend Christian and his circle of friends. Christian has been wanting to break up with Dani for a long time now, but Dani's sister's murder-suicide compels him to stay with her out of guilt. He invites her to come with him and his friends on a trip to a swedish midsummer festival (him going was against her wishes) and when they arrive they are drugged and, not very shockingly, the festival turns out to be a cult trap.
Now, the part I want to discuss is the movie's ending. Over the course of the film, the small circle of friends get picked off by the cult one by one in classic horror movie fashion as Dani and Christian grow more and more distant in their relationship. Dani soon embraces the lifestyle of the cult while Christian gets repeatedly drugged and coerced into impregnating one of the cult members. Dani, having witnessed this, orders Christian to be burned alive and sacrificed to the cult's deity as an act of revenge and ultimately her way of breaking up.
When I initially saw this in theatres, I saw this as a strangely happy ending because Dani finally cut ties with her emotionally distant boyfriend. However, the more I thought about it, I actually felt incredibly guilty for feeling this way, and now I feel that Dani is intended to be the antagonist in this story. While it may feel right to cheer for Dani for finally removing possible the most negative aspect of her life, her emotionally distant and neglectful boyfriend, there's a couple things to keep in mind; for one, Christian did not even want to be in this relationship with Dani and has grown distant from her long before the events of the movie and had planned to break up with her, but stayed with her out of guilt. Second, and probably more disturbing, Dani celebrates her "breaking up" with her boyfriend by having him paralyzed and burned alive after he had just been drugged and raped by the cult.
I saw so many impressions on twitter during the initial release of this movie who found the ending so satisfying for having Christian "getting what he deserved" and I feel like the movie wants us to feel this way because that sort of thought process is disturbing and the self-reflection of realizing that we cheered for the death of a man who had been raped is ultimately one of the most terrifying aspects of the entire movie.
So era, what are your thoughts on Midsommar and it's ending?
To summarize, Midsommar follows Dani, a young woman traumatized after the her younger sister commits a murder-suicide against their parents, and her neglectful boyfriend Christian and his circle of friends. Christian has been wanting to break up with Dani for a long time now, but Dani's sister's murder-suicide compels him to stay with her out of guilt. He invites her to come with him and his friends on a trip to a swedish midsummer festival (him going was against her wishes) and when they arrive they are drugged and, not very shockingly, the festival turns out to be a cult trap.
Now, the part I want to discuss is the movie's ending. Over the course of the film, the small circle of friends get picked off by the cult one by one in classic horror movie fashion as Dani and Christian grow more and more distant in their relationship. Dani soon embraces the lifestyle of the cult while Christian gets repeatedly drugged and coerced into impregnating one of the cult members. Dani, having witnessed this, orders Christian to be burned alive and sacrificed to the cult's deity as an act of revenge and ultimately her way of breaking up.
When I initially saw this in theatres, I saw this as a strangely happy ending because Dani finally cut ties with her emotionally distant boyfriend. However, the more I thought about it, I actually felt incredibly guilty for feeling this way, and now I feel that Dani is intended to be the antagonist in this story. While it may feel right to cheer for Dani for finally removing possible the most negative aspect of her life, her emotionally distant and neglectful boyfriend, there's a couple things to keep in mind; for one, Christian did not even want to be in this relationship with Dani and has grown distant from her long before the events of the movie and had planned to break up with her, but stayed with her out of guilt. Second, and probably more disturbing, Dani celebrates her "breaking up" with her boyfriend by having him paralyzed and burned alive after he had just been drugged and raped by the cult.
I saw so many impressions on twitter during the initial release of this movie who found the ending so satisfying for having Christian "getting what he deserved" and I feel like the movie wants us to feel this way because that sort of thought process is disturbing and the self-reflection of realizing that we cheered for the death of a man who had been raped is ultimately one of the most terrifying aspects of the entire movie.
So era, what are your thoughts on Midsommar and it's ending?
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