FILM REVIEW: SENTIMENTAL VALUE
- Cathryn Bell
- Feb 23
- 5 min read
At the 2026 BAFTAs, Sentimental Value won Best Film not in the English Language. In his acceptance speech, director Joachim Trier spoke of the importance of cinema with a humanist focus, an antidote to the tide of films designed to perpetuate a materialist capitalist society. Films that “try to sell us ideas, things, ideology — they use the moving image for that.” We see it in movies where, before the film's even released, we’re encouraged to buy the makeup, the clothes, the Airbnb experience of the film instead of crafting a story that lets us connect on a deeper level. Trier championed cinema made “for humanist viewing, … to see the other through empathy and curiosity.” Having watched Sentimental Value, I commend Trier for achieving his goal remarkably and beautifully well in this quietly powerful film.
The film opens with dreamlike shots of a beautiful wooden house in Oslo. The camera pans over worn timber in vivid hues of earthy brown and crimson red. Hand-chiselled awnings and window frames are crafted in the Dragestil style of late-19th-century Norwegian architecture. This is a house with history. Screenwriters Eskil Vogt and Joachim Trier then brilliantly frame the story’s central themes by personifying the house in a childhood assignment. As a child, Nora (played in adulthood by Renate Reinsve) is asked to write an essay where she is an object. She chooses to be her house — the home we’ve just been introduced to in the opening shots. Nora describes how the house’s belly shakes as she and her sister run down the stairs. She wonders if it’s ticklish as they rub jam on the walls, or if it likes being full and stamped on.
We watch a Terrence Malick-esque montage of the house throughout its history. Gustav’s mother listening to records with her friends in the 1950s. High heels scraping the floor at a house party in the sixties. A glass shattering violently, pieces scattering like an exploding star as Nora’s parents argue and slam doors.
It’s a beautiful framing device. Capturing the innocence of a child’s perspective in a house full of complex relationships and memories. The house itself becomes a witness to the unfolding of family history — the good, bad and everything in between. A crack in the foundation walls symbolises the cracks within the family, whilst reminding us of the impermanence of human life. Of all life. We are here for such a short time. Yet we waste it with conflict, things unsaid and things misunderstood — forgetting all we have is each other, all we have is now, and then it is gone. Forever.
In the present day, Nora has grown up to be an actress. Her father Gustav (played exquisitely by Stellan Skarsgård) is a famous director and filmmaker who has long since left the family home and has a fractured relationship with his two daughters. His youngest, Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) is a happily married historian. Joachim Trier has an extraordinary way of capturing a moment on screen that holds two opposites at once. This is best portrayed in the beginning of the film when Nora struggles with an overwhelming attack of stage fright, seconds before curtain up. A director encourages her to control her breathing. Still fighting the panic, she gets her lover (Anders Danielsen Lie) to make out with her, then slap her. We think she’s calm until she literally sprints backstage and starts ripping off her costume as stage techs desperately try to gaffer tape her back into it. Played by the masterful Renate, the moment is both immensely funny and disturbing. A symptom of something deeper.
In my own time as an actress, I’m all too familiar with the complicated relationship an actor has to their craft. It is a thing that thrills as well as maims you.
All too easily, the characters you play can erase your own identity. You can find yourself living more in the lives of others than yourself. It’s something drama schools neglect to prepare you for and often learnt too late. Acting is often seen as a glamorous profession, but glamour is an illusion. I’m glad Trier has shown how taxing and challenging this art form can be for performers and for all the crew, who work together to get Nora ready for the stage and finally begin the show. Joachim has described in interviews how his film crews are like family, that genuine care is captured in this moment in the film.
The two sisters Agnes and Nora return to their childhood home to host their mother’s funeral. They are surprised when Gustav turns up, having abandoned them years ago. We quickly get the impression that Agnes is the more lenient sister, whilst Nora is full of barely suppressed rage. Yet both are guarded with him. When Gustav invites Nora for a chat over a coffee he presents her with his latest film script and begs her to play the lead. An olive branch to repair their broken relationship? Or a narcissistic play to use her talents to reignite his own fading career? Nora suspects the latter. Furious and insulted, she refuses to even read it and storms out. Yet Trier chooses to let the camera linger on Skarsgård’s crestfallen face, and a seed of doubt is sown for us. Perhaps their issues and his intentions are more nuanced than they appear…
The film proceeds to navigate the fallout. Gustav recruits Hollywood star Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning) to perform Nora’s role. Nora meanwhile returns to the stage but her mental health struggles and unhealed history begin to impact every corner of her life. Agnes, the quieter observant sibling seems to have inherited her mother’s therapist abilities, and chooses research to try and understand the family and perhaps bring about a healing for all of them. A deeply moving moment occurs when she uncovers the depths of the brutality her grandmother endured. (As a member of the Norwegian resistance she was tortured by the Nazis.) Her suffering had a significant impact on her life and we begin to understand why Gustav is such a poor communicator and the lasting damage of generational trauma.
Joachim Trier is unafraid to explore conflict and complex themes within his films. Trauma. Illness. Anxiety. Lost love and family dynamics. Yet his work also immortalises those small intimate beauties of life.
Cinematographer Kasper Tuxen gifts us with shots of waves of glittering sunlight as the trees outside cast shadows on the walls. The quiet intimacy of Nora and Jakob relaxed, talking in bed together. And the laughter and joy as Gustav films on his grandson’s phone. We see Skarsgård’s playful side as he teaches him to play with cinematic perspective. Throwing a red spade, the camera quick cuts — and he’s comically impaled to his grandson’s delight. Trier uses this lighter moment to play with themes of perspective and memory and lean into his humanist cinema.
Without any spoilers, there is a powerful scene late in the film and Joachim’s own father played a hand in its potency. Trier’s father, a sound engineer, instilled his son with a reverence for silence. The film is scored by Hania Rani who weaves an emotive score that gently embraces the film. Yet in this emotional scene, no music is used. We simply hear the characters breathe. Stay with their eye contact. The soft rustle of clothes shifting as their ribs expand. Everything is said in that look, without words. It’s profound beyond measure. Just family knowing each other the way only family can.
FILM REVIEW by Cathryn Bell
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