Dogma Rules Add “Character” to Italian for Beginners

Dogma Rules Add “Character” to Italian for Beginners

Art films are different from mainstream films in many aspects including acting, plot, and setting. Art filmmakers use different techniques to distinguish their films from mainstream films. The movement away from mainstream filmmaking occurred through the creation of the Dogma Manifesto. Dogma 95 was a set of rules for film production that forced filmmakers to innovate through new methods of filmmaking. One such film created according to the rules of Dogma 95 is Italian for Beginners. Although Italian for Beginners does not follow all of the aesthetic rules of Dogma film production, the characters and their stories allow the viewer to engage with the film on both a formal and content level.

Italian for Beginners follows many of the Dogma rules, but it does not adhere to the eighth rule that genre movies are not allowed in Dogma film. Peter Schepelern claims that, “the film is a romantic comedy, and it is precisely the genre-related organization of the romantic connections between the six somewhat odd and traumatized main characters that is the film’s strength.” (95). Therefore, breaking one of the commandments of Dogma film does not detract from Italian for Beginners. Even though “a genre always comes with its own implicit set of rules” (Schepelern 98), the director and writer of Italian for Beginners, Lone Scherfig, is successful. This success can be attributed to Scherfig not allowing genre to affect the depth of the characters. If the characters had to fit into certain prototypes, then the film would not accomplish the goals of Dogma 95. The six main characters do not have typical relationships and they are not simple people. For example, Olympia has fetal alcoho...

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... film producers will look for other ways to adapt filmmaking. Filmmaking has gone through many changes over the years, such as the New Wave movements, Dogma and_________. Writers and producers have looked for ways to make their films standout and they will most likely continue to be inventive in the future.

Works Cited

Bordwell, David. “The Art Cinema as a Mode of Film Practice.” Film Theory and Criticism. Eds. Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen. Oxford University Press, 2009: 649-657.

Nestingen, Andrew K, and Trevor G Elkington. Transnational Cinema in a Global North: Nordic Cinema in Transition. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2005: 73-111.

Schepelern, Peter. "Film according to Dogma: Ground Rules, Obstacles, and Liberations." Transnational Cinema in a Global North. Eds. Andrew Nestingen and Trevor G. Elkington. Detroit: Wayne State Press, 2005: 73-107