Ordet (Das Wort)

"Ordet" is Dreyer’s most formidable work, provided one is willing to understand the word in its original sense: a challenge, a "stumbling block" in the Kierkegaardian sense. "Ordet" deals with the precarious nature of human "home" and unfolds within the well-ordered domesticity of a Danish farmhouse. It concerns the realms where we dwell and abide: the house, language, faith, unbelief, and love. And it addresses that which shatters our dwelling place: the homelessness of death. It is not merely "a" film about death—and thus about homelessness, that inexplicable power that brings an end to all turning toward others and all responding—but *the* definitive film on the subject. At its center lies the infinitely calm, final image of a room where, bathed in light, the coffin containing a young woman’s body stands. The film concludes with a resurrection—a miracle that Dreyer captures with insistent realism, as if it were a simple fact rather than an absurdity born of longing; this approach only intensifies the profound impact on the viewer. (Harry Tomicek)

In the presence of family and close associates.