The Idiots (Dogma '95)
Experimental film by Lars Von Trier about a group of young people pretending to be idiots and not adhering to any social norms or conventions.
A small Danish town is rocked by a motley group of youngsters who turn up in different places, pretending to be people with mental disabilities. By letting their ‘inner idiot’ do the talking, they protest against bourgeois normality and aim to create a better world. When Karen happens to meet three of these youngsters in a restaurant, she is drawn into their game.
The group’s base of operations is the mansion of Stoffer’s uncle, the group’s power-hungry leader. Stoffer challenges the others to take their sexual and psychological experiments to the extreme. Is the group prepared to follow him?
The Idiots provokes and disturbs. The film divided viewers into ardent supporters and detractors; exactly as von Trier had intended. The film was the second film (following Festen) made according to the rules of the Dogma 95 manifesto.