The Danish Girl (film)
The Danish Girl is a 2015 biographical romantic drama film directed by Tom Hooper, based on the 2000 novel of the same name by David Ebershoff, and loosely inspired by the lives of Danish painters Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener. The film stars Eddie Redmayne as Elbe, one of the first known recipients of sex reassignment surgery, Alicia Vikander as Wegener, and Sebastian Koch as Kurt Warnekros, with Ben Whishaw, Amber Heard, and Matthias Schoenaerts in supporting roles.
The film participated in the main competition of the 72nd Venice International Film Festival, and it was shown in the Special Presentations section of the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival. The film was released in a limited release on 27 November 2015 by Focus Features in the United States. The film was released on 1 January 2016, in the United Kingdom, with Universal Pictures International handling international distribution.
The film received some criticism for its inaccurate portrayal of historical events, but Redmayne and Vikander's performances received widespread acclaim and nominations for all of the major acting awards. For their performances, Vikander won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and Redmayne was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, while the film received additional Academy Award nominations for Best Production Design and Best Costume Design. It was also nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best British Film.
Plot
In mid-1920s Copenhagen, portrait artist Gerda Wegener asks her husband, popular landscape artist Einar Wegener, to stand in for a female model who is late coming to their flat to pose for a painting she's working on.The act of posing as a female figure unmasks Einar's life-long gender identity as a woman, who names herself Lili Elbe. This sets off a progression, first tentative and then irreversible, of leaving behind the identity as Einar, which she has struggled to maintain all her life. This takes place as both Lili and Gerda relocate to Paris; Gerda's portraits of Lili in her feminine state attract serious attention from art dealers in a way that her previous portraiture had not. It is there that Gerda tracks down art dealer Hans Axgil, a childhood friend of Lili. Hans and Gerda's mutual attraction is a challenge, as Gerda is navigating her changing relationship to Lili; but Hans' long-time friendship with and affection for Lili cause him to be supportive of both Lili and Gerda.
As Lili's continued existence presenting as male becomes too much to bear, she starts to seek help from psychologists, but none yields any result, and, in one instance, almost leads her into being committed to an asylum. Eventually, at Hans's recommendation, Lili and Gerda meet Dr. Kurt Warnekros. Dr. Warnekros explains that he has met several people like her, who are physically male but identify as female, and proposes a new, innovative and controversial solution: male to female sex reassignment surgery. This would entail a two-part procedure that involves first removing Lili's external genitalia and then, after a period of recovery, fashioning a vagina. He warns Lili and Gerda that it is a very dangerous operation that has never been attempted before, and Lili would be one of the first to undergo it. Lili immediately agrees and, soon after, travels to Germany to begin the surgery.
Lili eventually dies of complications from the surgery. The film ends with Gerda and Hans on a hilltop back in Denmark, in front of the five trees Lili had painted. The scarf that Lili had originally given Gerda, and that had subsequently been given back and forth several times, is carried away on the wind, dancing.
Cast
- Eddie Redmayne as Einar Wegener / Lili Elbe
- Alicia Vikander as Gerda Wegener
- Matthias Schoenaerts as Hans Axgil
- Ben Whishaw as Henrik Sandahl
- Amber Heard as Ulla Paulson
- Sebastian Koch as Dr. Kurt Warnekros
- Pip Torrens as Dr. Jens Hexler
- Nicholas Woodeson as Dr. Buson
- Emerald Fennell as Elsa
- Adrian Schiller as Rasmussen
- Henry Pettigrew as Niels
- Pixie as Hvappe, the Jack Russell dog
Production
Development
Screenwriter Lucinda Coxon worked on the screenplay for a decade before it was produced. She told Creative Screenwriting:I started in 2004 and within a couple of years we had a script we were happy to send out. We were terribly excited and I was fantastically naïve, because when you fall in love with a project, you assume that everyone else will be in love with it as well. The actors were very much in love with it. Several well-known actresses wanted to play Gerda, but the subject matter made it quite difficult to find someone to play Lili. We scheduled various directors and with each director came a new draft.In September 2009, Tomas Alfredson revealed to Variety that production on the project would precede that of his upcoming Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy adaptation, adding: "We have been in talks for close to a year, and we are soon going into production". In December 2009, Swedish newspapers reported that Alfredson was no longer attached to direct The Danish Girl and would begin work on Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy next. Alfredson said he regretted that reports of him working on The Danish Girl spread before the deal was finalized. He also said that he still wanted to make the film and might return to the project.
On 12 January 2010, Swedish director Lasse Hallström told Swedish media that he had been assigned to replace Alfredson as director.
Casting
In 2008, Nicole Kidman was originally attached to play Einar/Lili and would also produce the film through her company Blossom Films. Charlize Theron was originally slated to play the role of Gerda Wegener but, after leaving the project, was replaced by Gwyneth Paltrow. Paltrow then left the project due to location changes. Uma Thurman was also a rumoured replacement. In September 2010, Marion Cotillard was rumored to be the lead candidate for the role of Gerda Wegener.On 11 June 2010, The Hollywood Reporter revealed that the film had received €1.2 million in subsidy financing from Germany's NRW Film Board. The conditions of the deal include the planned 19-day shoot in Germany. In February 2011, Screen Daily reported that the film would begin shooting in July of the same year and that Rachel Weisz would play Wegener. In May, it was revealed that both Weisz and Hallström had left the project.
On 28 April 2014, it was announced that Tom Hooper would direct the film with Eddie Redmayne as the lead. On 19 June 2014, Alicia Vikander was announced in the cast. On 8 January 2015, Matthias Schoenaerts joined the cast.
Filming
Filming was projected to start in Spring 2010 in Berlin. Coxon revealed to Creative Screenwriting that, when filming finally began with Hooper, he actually filmed an older version of the script:We had probably gone through 20 drafts before landing Tom Hooper. In fact, the one we shot was actually an early revised draft that Tom had read back in 2008. I did a fairly large rewrite for Tom, but in the end, we used a version with little revision from the original.Filming began in February 2015, and also took place at Nyhavn, where the iconic waterfront was transformed to look like Copenhagen in the 1930s. Sets for the Danish and Paris flats were built in the Elstree Studios in London and additional shooting took place in Copenhagen and Brussels. Production on the film concluded on 12 April 2015. Filming took 44 days for the 186 scenes in six countries.
Post-production
ended in September 2015. According to composer, Alexandre Desplat, post-production was very fast, with the film being cut as Desplat was writing the score, which was recorded only a week prior to the film's premiere at the Venice Film Festival.Hooper revealed to Indiewire and After Ellen that the film's ending is different from the novel and real life, and he de-emphasized the importance of the Hans storyline because he did not want to feel that there was a love possibility for Gerda with Hans that could in any way rival Lili. He wanted it to be ambiguous whether it would turn into a love affair, rather than a friendship, because he saw Lili and Gerda as the loves of each other's lives. He took the script in that direction to protect the importance of their relationship.
In an interview with MTV International, Vikander revealed that two scenes featuring Amber Heard dancing were cut from the film, as well as stating the first cut for the film was over 2 hours.
Release
On 4 March 2015, Focus Features set the film for a limited release on 27 November 2015. The film had its world premiere at the 72nd Venice Film Festival on 5 September 2015. Universal Pictures handled distribution in other territories outside the U.S., with a release on 1 January 2016, in the United Kingdom.Home media
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on 1 March 2016 in the United States.Marketing
The first image of Redmayne as Lili Elbe was revealed on 26 February 2015. A pair of posters of Redmayne and Vikander were then released in August, On 1 September 2015, the first trailer was released. on 19 November 2015, The first clip from the film was released.Reception
Box office
The Danish Girl has grossed $11.1 million in North America and $53.1 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $64.2 million, against a budget of $15 million.The film had a limited release in the United States and Canada across four cinemas in New York and Los Angeles on 27 November 2015 before expanding cinemas in December. The film earned $185,000 in its opening weekend, averaging $46,250, which is the sixth-best opening weekend per cinema average of 2015. The opening weekend’s audience was 58% female, and 67% were over 40.
Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a rating of 67% based on 241 reviews, with an average rating of 6.61/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "The Danish Girl serves as another showcase for Eddie Redmayne's talent—and poignantly explores thought-provoking themes with a beautifully filmed biopic drama". On Metacritic, the film has a score of 66 out of 100, based on 41 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".Independent film website FilmDebate credited The Danish Girl as the 'most important film of 2015', stating that 'This is not only the best movie of the year, but it is the most important. The story and performances come together in the truest of ways to make a film that the whole world needs to see and get behind.'
The film's acting, particularly that of Redmayne and Vikander in the lead roles, received considerable acclaim, with Marie Asner of Phantom Tollbooth stating that "the acting is what makes this film". Redmayne's performance was described as "another sterling example of just how deeply he can immerse himself into a role" by Jim Schembri of 3AW, and as "revealing, heartbreaking and believable" by Linda Cook of Quad-City Times.
Kyle Buchanan, writing for Vulture, complained that it was part of a trend of "queer and trans films that are actually about straight people", while Paul Byrnes for The Sydney Morning Herald said it was "a lost opportunity" in which "the frocks are more convincing than the emotions." Casey Plett, a transgender writer, criticized the script in a conversation in The Walrus as "atrocious and boring", going on to say "It's like someone got inspired by a Shakespeare tragedy, then combined the verbosity of R. L. Stine with the subtlety of Brendan Fraser."
Controversy
The Danish Girl has been criticized for being written similarly to forced feminization erotica, obscuring the actual story of a historical trans person, and for being based on a fictional book that does not tell the true story of Lili and Gerda Wegener. Redmayne's casting as Elbe also received some criticism due to the casting of a cisgender actor in a transgender role, which Redmayne acknowledged in an interview with Indiewire around the time of the film's release. In a 2018 GQ interview, he admitted he was unsure if he should have accepted the role in retrospect.Oscar category controversy
Alicia Vikander was awarded the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in the film, the film's only Oscar win out of the four nominations, a decision that the Academy was heavily criticized for as Vikander has about 1 hour of screen-time which is 50% of the film's run-time which qualifies her for a Best Actress Oscar. It was actually a decision made by the film's distributor, Focus Features, to campaign Vikander for the Oscar and all other prizes in the supporting actress category, in which many lead actresses have been nominated and even won. She was intentionally not shortlisted in the best actress category as she would have been competing against Brie Larson for her role in Room, which would have decreased her chances of winning while the supporting actress category had little competition. At both the Golden Globe Awards and the British Academy Awards, Vikander's performance in The Danish Girl was nominated for Best Actress and she was included in the Best Supporting Actress category for her work in Ex Machina.Historical accuracy
- Elbe was not the first transgender woman to undergo sex reassignment surgery, having been preceded by Dora Richter.
- The film is based on the novel The Danish Girl by David Ebershoff. The novel, as Ebershoff has stated, does not try to tell a true story. He not only imagined most of what he wrote about Elbe's inner life, but also created all of the other characters in the book, such as Hans and Henrik, both characters present in the film. Despite many inaccuracies, the film was marketed as a "true story" and "a true love story". Director Tom Hooper stated that the film is closer to the real story than Ebershoff's book.
- The character Ulla Paulson is a fictionalized version of Ulla Poulsen, a Danish ballerina and actress and very good friend of Lili and Gerda.
- The film begins in 1926, when Lili was 44 years old and Gerda was 40. Their marriage lasted 26 years ; they were respectively 22 and 18 years old when they got married. The film only mentions that Lili and Gerda had been married for 6 years.
- Gerda was a natural blonde and blue-eyed woman with pale skin, while Alicia Vikander is a natural brunette with brown eyes and natural olive skin. Vikander had to wear blonde wigs while filming the movie, and she also revealed to The New York Times that the filmmakers were obsessed with the fact that she did not look Scandinavian and paled her skin, to make her lighter.
- Gerda was 43–44 years old during the events portrayed in the film. Lili was 47 years old when she underwent sex reassignment surgery in 1930, and died the following year, at 48. Eddie Redmayne was 33 years old during filming, while Alicia Vikander was 26.
- Lili and Gerda moved to Paris in 1912, when they were 30 and 26 years old, respectively. The film appears to imply they moved to Paris in the late '20s. Paris was remarkably liberal in the 1910s and 1920s, which is the reason why Gerda and Lili settled there and Gerda lived openly as a lesbian in the city. The scene in which Lili, dressed in men's clothes, is beaten by two men in Paris after being assumed to be a lesbian is fictional.
- Lili's post-transition name was Lili Ilse Elvenes. The name "Lili Elbe", the only name used in the film, was made up by Copenhagen journalist Louise "Loulou" Lassen.
- Topics including Gerda's sexuality, which is evidenced by the subjects in her erotic drawings, and the disintegration of Gerda and Lili's relationship after having their marriage annulled in 1930, are omitted in both the novel and the film.
- Gerda's famous Lesbian Erotica paintings are never mentioned in the film, nor the fact that she was not present during Lili's last operation and death, but was living in Italy with her second husband, Italian officer Fernando Porta. Gerda divorced from Porta in 1936, did not have children, and never married again. She returned to Denmark, took to drinking, and died penniless in 1940. The character Hans Axgil did not exist in her life and was merely a loose inspiration from Porta, though the real Fernando Porta was not a childhood friend of Einar/Lili. Axgil is not a common Danish surname but was curiously the name coined and adopted by the Danish couple Axel and Eigil Axgil, the first gay couple ever to enter into a registered partnership.
- Lili's boyfriend at the time of her last surgery and death was French art dealer Claude Lejeune, whom she hoped to marry and have a child with. There is a photo of Lili and Lejeune together dating from 1928, when Lili was still legally married to Gerda. Lejeune is not mentioned in the film. The character Henrik is a fictional creation and is only loosely inspired by Lejeune.
- An important factor surrounding Lili's death was omitted from the film; she died from organ rejection due to a uterus transplant in 1931, at the age of 48, but in the film she dies after the second sex reassignment surgery.
- During the last scene, when Gerda and Hans are standing by Vejle Fjord, mountains are present in the background. Denmark has no mountains. The scenes were shot at the Mount Mannen in Norway and at the Isle of Sheppey in England. This historical inaccuracy was a conscious choice by the director, who later apologized to Danish people for his mistake.
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