Kirsten Dunst is currently starring in Melancholia, the nutty new film from Nazi-sympathizing jokester Lars von Trier. It looks like a wacky barrel of LOLs; the trailer is chock-full of existential crises as a bunch of characters deal with the impending near-destruction of the earth from a colliding planet. Like the rest of the von Trier oeuvre, it's light on the laffs and heavy on the "oh, I guess this was good? I mean, it played Cannes and did pretty well? I dunno, it's kind of alienating? Like, in a Kubrick kind of way? It wasn't sad sad or really frightening but I might have a nightmare about this anyway because, I dunno, I feel like my psyche was possibly attacked?" You know, that sort of film? You get it, because you've seen movies before! Kirsten Dunst, however, may need to hear a little explanation.
It’s been a while since Dunst was in a movie that required so much emoting. With starring roles as sad teenagers in Sophia Coppola’s The Virgin Suicides and Marie Antoinette, she proved that she can play exasperated and fragile very well. But in the last few years, a period in which her acting roles have been sparse, Dunst dipped her toe into the comedy pool, making appearances in supporting roles in the likes of Wimbledon, How to Lose Friends & Alienate People, and Elizabethtown, Cameron Crowe’s most recently attempt at setting moving images to inspirational Tom Petty songs.
It was her role in Elizabethtown that famously formed the basis of the contemporary film stock character: the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Coined by AV Club critic Nathan Rabin, the Manic Pixie Dream Girl is a character that is so common in movies these days, especially when the movie is a romantic comedy centered around a young man on a soul-searching journey who is in need of a spiritual guide who also manages to scrunch up her nose in the cutest way.
The Manic Dream Pixie Girl has become a staple in American film--just look at the whimsical career of Zooey Deschanel (who, coincidentally, got her start in Crowe’s Almost Famous). But that doesn’t mean everyone knows about it. Despite being the model for the character, Dunst had no idea what Moviefone reporter Mike Ryan was talking about when he brought up the concept in a recent interview.