The Five Obstructions
1h 27m
Lars von Trier • 2003 • Denmark-Switzerland-Belgium-France • Lars von Trier challenges his mentor.
Documents the re-making of Jørgen Leth's classic short film The Perfect Human through a maddening maze of obstacles imposed by his former student Lars von Trier.
In 1967, prominent Danish filmmaker Jørgen Leth directed The Perfect Human, a beguiling short film in which a man and woman pace around a white room as if they were subjects in a zoo. Nearly four decades later contemporary cinema's enfant terrible Lars von Trier challenges his former mentor to re-make this classic short, but with a catch— each version is constrained by a new obstacle.
The Five Obstructions premiered at Venice, Mar del Plata, CPH:PIX, Göteborg, Sheffield, Tallinn Black Nights and Motovun, where it won the FIPRESCI Prize.