I’m starting this with a confession: I have not seen Sentimental Value director Joachim Trier’s previous film, the Oscar-nominated The Worst Person in the World (2021). I’ve heard incredible things about it and it has been on my watchlist, but I haven’t gotten around to it yet. I’m disappointed in myself because 1) I think some familiarity with a director helps inform criticism of their work and 2) based on my viewing of Sentimental Value, I think I would really like it. I’m making a promise to myself right now that I will get to it sooner rather than later. But this is about Sentimental Value. A movie I knew virtually nothing about except that it received widespread acclaim and won the Grand Prix (the second-most prestigious prize after the Palme d’Or) at the 2025 Cannes Film Festival. And not having seen a Joachim Trier film before, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the Danish-Norwegian director. But I was really moved by Sentimental Value. It’s a story of family, past, present and future, told with sadness, humor, and style.

Sisters Nora (Renate Reinsve) and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) are dealing with the passing of their mother when their father comes back into their lives. Gustav (Stellan Skarsgård) is a world-renowned filmmaker who always put his work ahead of his personal life and abandoned the family when the girls were young. He returns after years of estrangement to the Oslo residence where the girls were raised by their mom that’s been in Gustav’s family for generations. Years since he’s made a great movie, Gustav presents Nora, a fairly well-known actress in Norway, with his new script containing a lead role written specifically for her. This is meant to be his comeback, his best work yet, and he wants to film it in his family’s home as the story is not-so-subtly based on his own mother’s tragic story. The offer also feels like an olive branch to mend their broken relationship. Nora, not ready to forgive her father or deal with the deep-seated wounds he caused, turns him down. Then Gustav meets American star Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning). She’s looking to do something different, something special, so Gustav casts her as the lead. As the production moves forward, Nora wrestles with her interest in the project, Gustav is plagued by the sense that something isn’t quite right with it, Rachel questions if this story is truly hers to tell, and Agnes fights to maintain the illusion that she can keep the family intact.

On paper, the central relationship of the movie is between father, Gustav, and eldest daughter, Nora. Gustav is charming and roguish, to everyone except his daughters who have long seen past his persona. But over the course of the movie, we see him coming to terms with his mistakes and falling into a more timid version of his typically cocksure self. Trier told The Hollywood Reporter, “The idea of the father in this story was that kind of director who can see something very lucid and clear in his art, but, in real life, is a bit of an avoiding asshole. I found that interesting.” Skarsgård added in the same interview, “It’s something very common among directors. They can be fantastic at explaining the psychology of a person you’re playing and hopeless when it comes to their own life.” More similar than they are different, Nora is as stubborn as her father, initially refusing to be around him, let alone forgive him for being absent and drunk during her childhood. But something else they have in common is they are both artists. After Rachel pulls out of Gustav’s movie, realizing the role is meant for Nora and no one else, Nora agrees to do it. The final scene shows Nora on set, playing a role that mirrors both Gustav’s mother’s struggles with depression and Nora’s own. They still can’t communicate like normal people, never having sat down and talked through their years of pent-up issues, but they have found a way to reach each other in their own way. The only way they know how: through their art. Gustav’s script and Nora’s performance of it say everything they don’t have the skills to actually verbalize. Highly personal art can hurt but it can also heal. Trier said, “They deeply love each other, but maybe this is the best they can do — make a film together. Maybe that’s enough,” (The Hollywood Reporter). Even just that quote hurts my heart. But in the same ways it’s a sad idea, it’s also somewhat hopeful. He continued, saying, “Reconciliation in a relationship that fraught is just baby steps, maybe even just acceptance of what will never be.” Skarsgård added, “There’s no happy ending. Closure doesn’t exist. There’s always scar tissue, always pain. But in that single gaze, there’s hope. It’s the beginning of maybe forgiveness.” I love how honest this portrayal of relationships is. It’s often impossible to completely heal past wounds, but these two stubborn souls both moved an inch and that’s something.

While Gustav and Nora’s relationship is the driving force of the plot, the most affecting connection in the film is the one between sisters Nora and Agnes. Theirs is the story that sneaks up on you. Their relationship seems so steady and light for most of the movie. They are support systems for each other and spend time together often. But as the toll of their mother’s death, their father’s reappearance, and all of the scars of her past reopening begins to break Nora down, the true nature of their relationship reveals itself. Agnes is stable and stalwart, in a loving marriage with a child, in control of her emotions, and able to forgive and move on (for the most part). Nora, on the other hand, grapples with severe anxiety, is having an affair with a married man, and is both avoidant and at the mercy of her own emotions, often falling into states of depression and even attempted suicide a few years prior. In her lowest moment, Nora is comforted by Agnes. Nora asks her, “How did it happen? You turned out fine and I’m fucked up,” referencing their shared childhood trauma. Agnes replies, “But we didn’t have the same childhood. I had you.” And that’s the moment that completely broke me. When their parents were constantly fighting and then after Gustav left, Nora looked after her younger sister, becoming almost another parent to her without really being able to handle that responsibility. But she did it willingly for the love of her sister. Now, in adulthood, their roles have reversed. It is Agnes who has become the protector of her more fragile sister, repaying the favor Nora gave to her as children. This scene between the two late in the film was so beautiful and moving, it’s the moment that has stuck with me the most, the one I keep replaying in my head (and brings me to tears almost every time).

This movie would not be nearly as powerful if not for the incredible performances by the entire cast. Renate Reinsve was the star of Trier’s The Worst Person in the World and returns to be the emotional core of Sentimental Value. It is unbelievable how she is able to make Nora both tough and delicate, projecting both at the same time while also carrying an immense sadness and surprising humor. Those who have seen her understand her star power, but I expect we’ll only be hearing about her more and more. Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas who plays Agnes is mostly unknown outside Norway but she really blew me away. She matches Reinsve on every level in their scenes together and also brings her own emotional weight to solo moments. Stellan Skarsgård is a seasoned pro but his performance was really moving as Gustav sheds the layers of his ego and reveals the vulnerability beneath. A man realizing he’s in the latter half of his life and reckoning with how he’s spent it. But like Reinsve, he also mixes in a dry humor. Something that must run in the family. Elle Fanning is kind of the odd one out as both her character and herself, being the only English-speaking actor. But she uses that in her performance to make Rachel constantly uneasy in this world and feeling like she doesn’t belong. Elle never misses in my book.

It’s the most cliche film criticism to say “the house is a character in the story” but it’s hard not to say when it’s so evidently true here. The house in Oslo is a gorgeous Dragestil mansion that has garden space but also views of the city. It’s right out of a fairytale. The house has seen the Borg family through generations. Meaning it has seen happy memories but also sorrow and pain and tragedy. All of that still lives within the walls. It’s a character but also a symbol, representing the generational trauma of families, exemplified most through a large crack in the wall, a flaw in the foundation. Like the house itself, the grief and sadness within the family dating back to Gustav’s mother’s trial, imprisonment, and torture during the German occupation and subsequent suicide within that very house, is passed down and inherited. And it’s cyclical. History is constantly being rehashed, with the current generations recalling their own pleasant and hurtful memories while also looking into archival records of past generations and recreating their stories in Gustav’s film. It’s both a beautiful way to represent the way our stories live on in others after we’re gone, but also a somber view of how our own internal traumas don’t just start and end with us. When Gustav sells the house at the end, it is completely remodeled, going from charming and homey to sleek and modern and hollow. A clean slate for a new family to move in and imprint their own legacy.

Sentimental Value is in some ways beautifully simplistic and intimate, but it is also stylistically intricate. In addition to straightfoward shots that are elevated by gorgeous cinematography, staging, and film grain, Trier also employs plenty of flourishes that add complexity. We see montages of the Borg family history, period-set flashbacks to the different eras, and a sequence of different characters faces morphing into each other. All moments meant to underline the continuous mix of past and present within this house and this family. There are also some very artsy shots of the house from different views and angles. While the film has a great soundtrack, it gets very quiet at times. Enough to hear the house creaking. Reminding us of its presence. Throughout the entire film, Trier chooses to cut to black between every scene instead of transitioning between them. This leaves the movie feeling like a collection of little vignettes rather than one continuous story. And while the film really is more like the latter than the former, the stylistic choice emphasizes that life really is more like a bunch of moments than a single, uninterrupted road. Some of these moments are good, some are bad, some we can’t help but remember, and some we choose to forget. Sentimental Value is a film about honoring and remembering the past without feeling bound by it in the present. The only way to stop generational trauma is to break the cycle. To leave certain fragments of your narrative behind and forge a new road.

When the movie ended, the girl next to me in the theater said to her friend, “This is my favorite movie I’ve seen in a long time. I would go to the movies all the time if they were like this.” I don’t think I would go that far, but I loved the movie and I also loved that she loved it so much. I worry a film like this will be underseen because it is mostly in Norwegian with English subtitles but I urge you not to be afraid of that! The journey is worth it, I promise! Sentimental Value is raw and open without being intentionally geared to tug at the heartstrings. It’s subtle until it’s not and then becomes incredibly deep and powerful. Co-screenwriter Eskil Vogt told The Hollywood Reporter, “It’s easy to manipulate emotions; it’s easy to make people cry. That’s not a measure of quality. The title Sentimental Value was our way of admitting it. These emotions have value only if they come from an honest place.” And I loved how honest it felt. I also personally always enjoy a movie about making movies so that was fun in addition to the new lens of using your art to say what you can’t. This movie feels particularly geared towards eldest daughters (way more than Taylor Swift’s new song), but also anyone with a family can find ideas to relate to regarding identity and legacy and communicating with the people who love most. This one will definitely be in the Oscars conversation so I highly recommend checking it out!

2025 Count: 75 movies, 47 seasons of television, 4 specials