Europa

A comic-fantasy nightmare of the wickedest kind. [22 Jul 1992, p.4D

At once retro and futuristic, the hyperstylized film recalls every wartime-era espionage/romance/noir flick, and in particular owes a debt to Lynch's Eraserhead, with its shadowy industrial backgrounds and throbbing soundtrack. Read full review

Labyrintine and hypnotic, there's undoubtedly more style than substance to the film, but Von Trier manages to blind and bewilder his audience in a truly masterful manner. Read full review

Although the actual story of Zentropa is the stuff of an ordinary thriller, that plot is the only conventional aspect of a film that is an almost impudently flashy and knowing exercise in post-modern cinematic expressionism. Read full review

In the end, Zentropa is above all unique in its radical take on the inherent confusion of postwar Europe, offering the viewer a glimpse like none he has had before. Read full review

The film is too confusing to be successful, but too striking and visually beautiful to be ignored. Read full review

It's an obscure experience, partly alienating, partly enthralling; it weaves a spell that is frightening, irritating and invigorating all at once. Read full review

Europa has been described as a Kafka-esque fever dream, and while that isn't inaccurate, it's also a cover for the film's confounding narrative, which wends through murky noir plotting, a polyglot of accents and performance styles, and surreal interludes. The best approach is not to puzzle too much over the details, and to marvel at von Trier's technical wizardry, which re-imagines the period through a patchwork of vivid impressions. Read full review

A bizarre, dreamlike, surrealistic thriller, Zentropa is one of those films that is easier to admire than like. Creatively crafted and finely tuned, it is also an extremely cold, nihilistic work - as starkly efficient as the imperious railroad company that forms the centerpiece. [03 Jul 1992, p.C]

Zentropa is a film in sunglasses and a black beret, melodramatic and formidable. It took me two viewings of the movie to realize that a compelling story emerges when its surreal settings, harsh lighting, macabre characterizations, dreamlike images and cartoonishly stilted performances are set aside. [26 Jun 1992, p.G5]

Von Trier and his three cinematographers fashioned a handmade, retro pastiche with a small, dried-out heart. Read full review

Von Trier is undeniably talented, but Zentropa, which won the 1991 Jury Prize at Cannes, comes across mostly as an exercise in pseudo-profundity. It’s got more metaphors than it knows what to do with. Read full review

Zentropa is as muddled as it is stylized. Read full review

Von Trier's visuals are stunning enough to almost conceal the hollowness of his elliptical story. [03 Jul 1992, p.42]

Zentropa seems like the work of a precocious child who's been given too many expensive toys. [10 Jul 1992, p.24]