Love, Life and Loss in Roy Andersson’s ‘Living Trilogy’
The films of Swedish filmmaker Roy Andersson speak to a certain truth about the fragility and ephemeral nature of life itself, yet his style reflects anything but, setting his iconic Cannes-winning Living Trilogy in a space that better represents the liminal world between reality and fantasy. Dressed in a muted greyscale, Andersson’s world houses mumbling souls who shuffle from place to place, seemingly waiting for their own demise in a sombre meditation on contemporary life.
Released at the turn of the new millennium, Songs from the Second Floor, the first film in the trilogy, was a cinematic revelation that departed significantly in tone from Andersson’s gorgeous 1970 coming-of-age film Swedish Love Story. Inspired by a poem from the Peruvian writer César Vallejo, Andersson’s film strips away the need for a strict narrative, instead exploring life as if it were a tapestry, where every figure is desperately seeking meaning and purpose, both interpersonal and existential.
Though not an entirely approachable film, with its pale exterior and awkward exchanges of dialogue being understandably off-putting, Songs from the Second Floor is, in reality, the antithesis of what it presents itself as being. A film that explores the insecurities and contemplative solitude that we each have within us, as well as the absurdity inherent in modern life’s bizarre demands, Andersson’s film directly allocates the heart of the human condition.
The same can, indeed, be said of 2007’s You, The Living and 2014’s A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence, which, although not sharing the same characters or narrative, are brothers in tone and filmmaking style. Without a comprehensible plot, Andersson’s films are essentially stylised presentations of his meditations on life, with scenes being staged and neatly arranged as if they were theatrical shows.
Indeed, Andersson made sure he had total control over each instalment in the series, filming each one entirely on an indoor set, mimicking the outdoors with clever artificial paintings and perspective tricks. Such places the viewer in a peculiar position, as if they are peering into a model village, a microcosm of life itself which holds a profound mirror up to one’s own ethereal existence.
“I’ve come to realise that I can’t shoot real environments. I prefer a hyperreality,” Andersson told The Guardian when addressing his own distinctive style, “It looks real, but it’s purified and condensed. I’m fascinated by how life’s grandness, smallness and mortality appear much clearer this way”. It is in this abstract compression of reality where Andersson’s films thrive, bypassing logical reason entirely to access something much deeper.
Inspired by the German expressionist Otto Dix as well as the American painter Edward Hopper, Andersson’s films are, however, not devoid of influence and context, with each one delicately associating themselves with political ideologies, including capitalism, fascism and colonialism, respectively. For Andersson, life is best reflected in the stillness of such painters, where solitude pervades every inch.
An analysis of life that somehow pierces the subconscious, despite not reflecting what reality is at all, Andersson manages to provide answers to life’s toughest questions, exploring love, tragedy and the wisdom of an omniscient entity.
