The Broken Circle Breakdown (2012)

Originally Published in The Daily Nebraskan, 2/7/2014

This has been done before. It’s very good, but it has been done before.

“The Broken Circle Breakdown,” a Belgian film up for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, tells the story of Didier (Johan Heldenbergh) and Elise (Veerle Baetens), two star-crossed lovers whose bond is tested by the death of their child.

Didier sings in a bluegrass band. He expresses a love for all things country. He’s an atheist, but he has a starry optimism about him. Elise works in a tattoo shop and is herself tattooed to oblivion. She has a tattoo for every boyfriend she ever had; all she needs to do when it’s over, she says, is get it covered up.
They also have a child they didn’t plan for. Didier steps up and builds a house in which to raise the child. We sense some trepidation, and so does Elise. Seven years go by, and their child, Maybelle, dies of cancer. There is an unforgettable shot during the funeral; while white roses are being thrown onto the small white coffin, it is suddenly splattered with mud by seemingly impatient grave diggers.

The timeline of the movie is fractured, a la “Blue Valentine” or “We Need to Talk About Kevin.” It opens with a scene during the terminal stages of Maybelle’s cancer. We cut back and forth between scenes where Didier and Elise meet, when they’re raising Maybelle and the multiple performances by their bluegrass band.

Sometimes the fractured narrative works. In the early scenes, the contrast between the optimism and joy of having a child and the deep pain of knowing that the child will die soon builds intrigue. Otherwise, it feels like a gimmick. Sometimes it’s just too obvious. Minutes before Didier and Elise are about to separate, we are given a flashback to when Didier and Elise first meet. Elise explains what she does with the tattoos of her exes names. It’s completely obvious what will happen next, so there’s no suspense when the big reveal happens.

 

It’s a very good film all around. Heldenbergh and Baetens have genuine chemistry, both in their tender moments alone and in their performance on the stage. They fulfill their roles convincingly, hurling insults and blame at each other for a tragedy they had no control over. It’s all very effective, moving and sad.

The problem I personally had with the movie is that it never seemed to go anywhere. The worst possible scenario is obvious in the first moments of the film and that’s exactly what happens. The disjunctive timeline of the film seems like a way to sidestep its shortcomings. I can imagine if it had been produced with a linear timeline, it would have been more predictable and much less interesting.

It’s all very sad, but there’s no catharsis. The performances, the score, the songs, the cinematography, just about everything that needs to be right about a movie is done right, but there remains that itching question in the back of my mind: what’s the point? Maybe the director only wanted to explore these two characters because he felt for them. That’s good enough for me.

All this being said, if you feel like seeing two people fall in love, have a child, lose that child and spiral into mutual self-destruction, all set to Dutch bluegrass music, then you definitely ought to see “The Broken Circle Breakdown.”