In ‘Sentimental Value,’ Stellan Skarsgård could’ve sought revenge. Instead, he could be looking at an Oscar

By Thomas Page, CNN

(CNN) — In taking on the role of a filmmaker in his latest movie, Stellan Skarsgård sniffed a chance at payback.

“I mean, what an opportunity for revenge,” the Swedish actor said, his eyes lighting up.

Sprinkle an idiosyncrasy here, a mannerism there, soaked up from seven decades on set. Few, if any, other actor can say they’ve worked with as iconic and eclectic a range of directors as Steven Spielberg, Lars von Trier, Denis Villeneuve and Ingmar Bergman, after all. But no, he clarified; if there was anything in his performance pulled from real life, it was “probably unconscious.”

Skarsgård was concentrating on a bigger question: Who was Gustav Borg, the Scandi auteur and catalyst of the Cannes-winning family drama, “Sentimental Value”? The character was, Skarsgård decided, more than a director. “I see him as an artist – and that’s the problem with him,” he explained.

“The art is a part of him. It’s his identity, and it’s hard to give up a part of that for his personal life … If you compromise too much, he ceases to be him. And that’s his fear.”

Instead of a caricature, the actor turned Gustav into someone irascible yet charming, softening and conflicted in their golden years. It’s a series of choices that could earn Skarsgård his first Academy Award nomination – maybe even a win.

Gustav is a supporting role with outsized influence in Joachim Trier’s film, about two sisters (Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) whose estranged father re-enters their life after the death of their mother.

Trier, a Norwegian Oscar nominee, returns following the success of 2021’s “The Worst Person in the World,” led by a magnetic Reinsve as a will-o’-the-wisp thirty-something. The other two films in his loose Oslo trilogy, “Reprise” and “Oslo August 31st,” also followed millennials striving for meaning in modernity among friends and lovers.

The filmmaker has become a father since his last movie, and as he returns to the city, it’s clear his lens on life has shifted, at least cinematically.

“Having kids and still having parents around made me question how short time is, and also the question of transference,” Trier said. “What did I get from my parents? And what am I transferring to my kids?”

“As a parent,” he added, “you think, ‘Oh, if I say all the right things, everything’s going to be fine.’ But I think being a family, the most interesting thing to explore in a story is all the unspoken stuff – the stuff that we don’t know how to talk about.”

In “Sentimental Value,” Trier and his regular writing partner Eskil Vogt tell a story of four generations through their quirky family home. Add a mercurial patriarch and adult children with daddy issues and “The Royal Tenenbaums” comparisons are inevitable, though ultimately thin (Wes Anderson would never attempt a “Vertigo”-esque subplot, as Trier does here).

Gustav’s daughter Agnes (Lilleaas) is a former child star of one of her father’s movies, now leading a civilian life. His other daughter Nora (Reinsve) is a stage and television actor, whose success has not filled a void left by her father and his ambivalence towards her career.

As was once observed about Dickie Greenleaf in “The Talented Mr. Ripley,” when you’re in his favour, “it’s like the sun shines on you and it’s glorious. And then he forgets you and it’s very, very cold.” Agnes and Nora are so frozen, they’re numb to their loss, until Gustav returns, kickstarting a painful thaw. He claims he has written a screenplay for Nora, but she refuses to play the part, forcing him to turn to American starlet Rachel Kemp (a game and perfectly incongruous Elle Fanning).

Nora was the starting point for Trier and Vogt, who were looking for a new project with Reinsve.

“It feels like a big gift to have someone like that writing something for you and scary at the same time,” she recalled.

“Joachim, he’s very intelligent and very wise, and sometimes he can see things in me that I haven’t even seen yet,” she said. “I’ve been so surprised by the different things that come up with working with him, because he wants to get you to a really raw, uncontrollable place.”

A writer-director directing an actor playing a writer-director. A writer-director writing a part for their muse, playing the daughter of a writer-director who has written a part for her. Think about it too much and “Sentimental Value” becomes an infinity mirror of filmmaking, reflecting screenplay and backstory back and forth. But the subject matter offers plenty of grist for the mill for an interviewer.

Gustav frequently deflects Kemp’s requests for notes, pushing her questions back on her. Not all directors are so reticent. Even when Skarsgård’s character is not on a set, Gustav believes he has the authority to dish out harsh truths. In one scene, he patronizingly tells his daughters that you cannot write “Ulysses” and drive the kids to soccer practice; that artists require selfishness to be great.

“I still feel provoked just remembering him saying (that),” Reinsve said.

“I have been acting since I was nine years old,” said the 37-year-old. “I hope it’s not that force that drives me, it’s something else, but I wouldn’t even know by now, would I?”

Lilleaas disagrees with the sentiment full stop.

“I don’t think you need to be selfish in order to be a good artist – I refuse that,” she said. “I will do anything in my power not to be the selfish parent … I want to be able to look my son in the eye when he’s older, and I want to be able to admit the faults or the mistakes I made. I will own it.”

For all Gustav’s faults, “Sentimental Value” insists he is the real deal through glimpses of his films: an artfully composed long take of orphans pursued by Nazis, shot through a train window, and a sly mirror shot in the film’s final act.

“I admire his hardcore artistic endeavours,” Trier said. “I had to really step up and try to make pieces of film that were very sophisticated and more like his … It’s really tough stuff, by really fun to make.”

Like Gustav, Trier shoots his movies on film and has found ways to protect his creative freedoms, including retaining final cut. Which is why it’s funny watching Gustav get pushed into the arms of Netflix, staging a cringeworthy press junket and springing on him that his film might not get a full theatrical release.

Trier said he hasn’t had any pushback from the streaming giant.

“I think the film is only saying, ‘Hey, first of all, Netflix seems to be working with good filmmakers’ – which is a fact,” he said. “The only thing I’m questioning is why can’t they show (their movies) in longer theatrical runs? Please. They have great taste; they have a great ability to draw in the right projects. I’m rooting for Netflix to be more theatrically oriented.”

“I care about the cinematic experience. But, yes, I watch films on Netflix too, and I really encourage any company to look at how Netflix has elevated great filmmakers,” he added.

“Sentimental Value” debuted in US cinemas on November 7, and will receive a strong awards season push from distributor NEON. The film has already been selected by Norway as its entry for the category of Best International Feature at the Academy Awards. The shortlist will be announced December 16.

“Sentimental Value” is on limited release in US theaters.

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