A down-and-out parent wants to see their children, taken from them by divorce. It’s one of the oldest plots in the book, and for good reason. It’s a heartfelt subject that constantly has new areas to probe and discover. Applause is one of those movies that understands that in these situations, there are no easy choices or quick fixes. Miracles are not  accomplished by the right heartfelt speech at the right time. You don’t get to see your kids again by dressing up like an old woman. Applause, despite some melodramatics and heavy-handed thematics, is a movie that gets it right.
A down-and-out parent wants to see their children, taken from them by divorce. It’s one of the oldest plots in the book, and for good reason. It’s a heartfelt subject that constantly has new areas to probe and discover. Applause is one of those movies that understands that in these situations, there are no easy choices or quick fixes. Miracles are not accomplished by the right heartfelt speech at the right time. You don’t get to see your kids again by dressing up like an old woman. Applause, despite some melodramatics and heavy-handed thematics, is a movie that gets it right.{{page_break}}
In Martin Zandvliet’s Applause, we examine Thea Barfoed (Paprika Steen), a once acclaimed actress of the stage now in recovery after a messy period of alcoholism which resulted in the departure of her husband Christian (Michael Falch) and their two children, William and Matthias (Otto Leonardo Steen Rieks and Noel Koch-Søfeldt). When we meet her, it’s clear she has drug herself out of a very deep, dark hole. It’s been eighteen months since her divorce. She’s sober, going to AA, and she has one goal: to be with her kids again. Her only obstacle is herself. Thea, you see, is a deeply narcissistic, self-loathing woman.
The film is sprinkled with flashbacks of Thea on stage, playing, appropriately enough, the taunting, heavy-drinker Martha from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and emotionally abusing her dresser. The parallels between the role of Martha and the reality of Thea’s life are practically trumpeted from the top of the tower. I found myself detached from this lack of subtlety, however, as Paprika Steen’s performance almost makes it impossible to notice.
Steen’s performance is the lifeblood of this movie. Given that she is in virtually every single frame, her skills as a performer were absolutely that which would make or break this film. Thankfully, Steen brings an absolutely searing, raw energy to the film. She’s an absolute powerhouse, in every sense of the word. I know she drew heavy praise when this film debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival, btu I hope that this performance doesn’t get lost in the shuffle when people start talking about next year’s awards season.
This, sadly, adds to the main flaw of the film. Other than Paprika Steen’s fantastic performance, there’s not a tremendous amount to the film. As previously mentioned, there’s a lot of ham-handed themes flying around. Subtlety of writing is not the film’s strong suit. Every flashback of Thea’s Virginia Woolf performance adds a little something extra to her character that’s more or less already readily apparent. While it’s interesting to see her pre-crack up, at the top of her game, what it adds to her character, at least from a script standpoint, is fairly nil. On top of that, the other actors do fail to rise to the heights Steen creates, but this is hardly something I can fault them for. They are doing a good job that happens to look less-so when sharing the screen with Thea.
The film also wears a love of John Cassavetes right on the sleeve. It has a grit to it, a real-world documentary sensibility. With a few name changes, we could be watching the fall of some real-life actress. It works phenomenally, allowing for a viewer to be more easily focused on the travails of Thea and not on some flash camera work or unnecessary flair.
Applause, opening today in Los Angeles, is a stunning portrayal of a woman just beginning to redeem herself. It pulls no punches and does not sentimentalize her, but allows us to believe that, even for the worst times, there’s always hope of something better, even if it takes a lot of hard choices and uncomfortable realizations.
