Lost My Shape: Death & Rebirth of Identity in Midsommar
BEWARE SPOILERS: We go into every post assuming you’ve already watched the film being discussed.
If the qualities and behaviors of friends, family, and lovers can influence the shapes of our identities, it stands to reason that our identities can be thrown into question when those same relationships are jeopardized or destroyed. The end of a relationship, sometimes even the thought of ending, often brings worry, stress, and mourning over what has been or will be lost. Rarely, though, do we flip to the other side and focus on what can be gained from the closure of doors that had seemed permanent fixtures in our lives.
Ari Aster’s second full-length, Midsommar, has both concerns in mind. By his own words, his folk horror follow-up to 2018’s Hereditary has been famously described and intended as a “break-up movie.” In an interview with IndieWire, Aster expounds upon his filmic touchstones that he referred to while crafting Midsommar. Despite the obvious connections to classics within the folk horror genre, especially The Wicker Man (that they both end in immolation is surely no coincidence), at heart, this is a movie focused more on the themes and ideas featured in Scenes from a Marriage, Modern Romance, and possibly Clueless than it is with simply regurgitating the well-trodden outsider-versus-Pagan-society conflicts.
In the wake of overwhelming tragedy and faced with the uncertainty of life beyond their four-year relationship, Dani Ardor (Florence Pugh) and Christian Hughes (Jack Reynor) reluctantly depart for the sunny hills of Hälsingland—a foreign town that serves the couple as a kind of limbo, testing each to see who they will become in the aftermath of their relationship. Dani emerges from her trials and tribulations with newfound purpose and identity. Christian, however, loses himself at every turn, burning every social bridge that formed his identity until flames consume the little bit that’s left.
A Masochistic Part of You
From the moment we meet Christian, he’s in a state of flux. His relationship with Dani is in its final breaths, and he appears unable to get his act together and (mercifully) break up with her.
Each of Christian’s friends, the foreign exchange student Pelle (Vilhelm Blomgren) and his grad school buddies, the lecherous Mark (Will Poulter) and the passionate anthropology student Josh (William Jackson Harper), offers him a way out of his misery. Mark discredits Dani with blunt misogyny, labelling her a crazy, nagging girlfriend:
Mark: Dude, you need to stop sitting on the fence with this.
Christian: But what if I end up regretting it a week later, and then I can’t get her back?
Mark: You don’t want her back!
Christian: I might!
Mark: So then you can bitch to us for that week about how much you regret it, and we'll be like, “Dude, you’ve been wanting out of this absurd relationship for the last year,” and you’ll be like, “Oh shit! That’s right,” and then you can find some new chick who actually likes sex and who doesn’t drag you through a million hoops a day.
Clearly, Christian has not only strained and abused his relationship with Dani, but through that relationship, he’s also put stress on connections with his grad school friends. This “on the fence” status has been going on for some time, and, for Mark, it’s gotten old.
This bit of dialogue also reveals the whole of Mark: rude, crude, and an unapologetic misogynist, but undeniably himself—unpleasant as that may be. And despite the misogyny in the way he says it, the sentiment behind Mark’s words has some truth: it’ll be tough to finally sever things with Dani, but in the end, everyone, including her, will be happier and more free.
Josh, on the other hand, reminds Christian of the other significant reason to break things off with Dani: his PhD. Nearly every decision Josh makes throughout the movie is guided by his academic studies and ambitions to be recognized as a serious anthropologist. Much like Mark, Josh knows exactly who he is and wants to be. He gives Christian, apparently in the same anthropology program, his own two cents:
Josh: Do you think a masochistic part of you is playing this drama out to distract you from the work you actually need to be doing?
Christian: And what work do I actually need to do, Josh?
Josh: Uhhh – your prospectus maybe? I dunno. Your PhD?
Josh acutely puts a name to the suffering that his cohort has been going through: a kind of masochism. Tiny fires have popped up all over Christian’s life, and rather than putting them out, he’s passively let them burn, and his friends have paid the price for his smoldering indecision. Simply put, Christian feels rudderless, uncertain of himself, and like an imposter, resulting in behaviors that damage the people close to him. I don’t mean to suggest sympathy for Christian, but it’s useful to recognize him as a directionless grad student to better understand how he lashes out and harms those around him, and as he falls further and further from himself.
Having had his options laid out, but unable to act on either, Christian treats Dani with resentful obligation, which he fulfills with tired ambition (a mental state expertly depicted in Reynor’s performance).
When Dani confronts Christian for trying to leave her out of the trip to Hälsingland, he quickly uses her insecurity to turn the tables:
Dani: I have no problem with you going! I just wish you'd involve me!
Christian: Well, I just apologized, Dani.
Dani: You didn't apologize, you said – (shrugs) – "sorry." Which sounds more like “too bad."
Christian: Maybe I should just go home.
Dani: … I’m just trying to understand.
Christian: And I tried apologizing.
Dani: I don't need an apology. I just wanna talk about it.
Christian: I think I should just probably go home.
Dani: I'm not trying to attack you.
Christian: Well, it feels like that.
Dani: Well – I’m sorry! I am sorry. I just got confused.
This back-and-forth characterizes much of the dialogue between the two. In this case, Dani has legitimate reason to confront Christian, but he warps the conversation to make himself the victim, exploiting a vulnerability instead of offering either comfort or honesty. He time and time again gaslights and demonizes Dani, refusing to validate her feelings, admit fault, or allow her even the slightest bit of power or agency. And if it’s not abundantly clear that Christian’s the villain in this relationship already, let’s not forget that Dani’s sister recently killed herself and their parents, making Dani the sole survivor in her immediate family.
Does He Feel Like Home To You?
Upon arriving in Hälsingland, Christian’s resentment and desperation appears to have grown exponentially, as he latches onto anything that would give him a clearer sense of identity and control over the fraught situation he finds himself in. His first attempt to take control and reshape his identity comes in the form of Maja (Isabelle Grill), a local redheaded Hårgas woman who has, conveniently, just come of age.
Misinterpreting the guidance of our American fool, Mark, Christian low-key pursues Maja as a sexual conquest. There may be a love potion at play in this plot thread, as we learn through a Hårgas tapestry and other visual cues, Christian willingly plays into Maja’s attempts to catch his eye, going as far as to drink the spiked water he knows will, “[Break] down your defenses and [open] you for the influence.”
Christian’s lust isn’t inherently wrong, but as I probably don’t have to explain, he hasn’t broken things off with Dani and is actively manipulating and cheating on his grieving girlfriend. That even Mark, in his own vulgar way, can articulate a more proper way of starting a new relationship only emphasizes Christian’s disregard and lack of respect for Dani.
Though the qualities he takes from his relationship with Mark are less directly harmful to his friend, Christian becomes something of a fatal snake to Josh. As Josh explains to Dani near the start of the film, his “focus is actually on European midsummer traditions. Which was actually sorta the impetus behind this whole trip.”
Though it’s suggested that Christian might have a vaguely similar idea, maybe “something Scandinavian,” unlike Josh, he steps foot in Hälsingland without a clear goal, throwing into question whether Christian really cares about his PhD. Even if he does, just as in his relationship with Dani, Christian’s dragging his feet. Then, suddenly, halfway through the film, after the Ättestupan ritual, Christian shares a breakthrough with Josh: “I’ve just been thinking, and I’ve decided … I really think I wanna do my thesis here. On the Hårgas. … And I wanted to tell you first, so that it didn’t seem like I wasn’t telling you.”
Josh, unsurprisingly, calls out Christian’s intellectual thievery immediately:
Josh: You think I don’t know what you’re doing? It’s actually kind of outrageously unsubtle. The fact that you’re being this bald about it. It’s impressive. It is. I’m honestly impressed.
Christian: What the fuck?
Josh: Oh, yeah - “What the fuck.” This is what I’ve been working towards and you know it. That’s why you looked so guilty when you brought it up. Because you know - you know - that what you’re doing is unethical and leechy and lazy and frankly kind of sad—
Christian: Okay, wow, fuck you—
Josh: No dude, not fuck me! Find your own subject - or your own passion. Because I’m actually invested in this. It’s not some glorified hobby that I’m casually dipping my feet into.
Much like his interactions with Dani, Christian easily finds a way to make himself the victim. When Josh finds out that Christian had made a special arrangement with Pelle, their guide, before telling him of this new “breakthrough” on his thesis, Josh sees the extent to which Christian has compromised his academic ambitions.
While Christian isn’t the literal force that kills Josh, his betrayal of their relationship puts Josh’s death into motion. Recognizing that he would need to go above and beyond the Hårgas research that his now-rival is synthesizing (which, almost as if he had also stolen an idea, or maybe a worldview, from Mark, is about the town’s sexuality and mating rituals), Josh sneaks out in the middle of the night to explore the current Rudi Radr, a Hårgan sacred text. Pushed by Christian’s disloyalty to violate the town’s boundaries and his own integrity as an anthropologist, Josh’s fate is sealed when someone wearing Mark’s clothes and skinned face knocks him unconscious and drags him away.
As a final insult to injury, Christian quickly washes his hands of any further connection to or responsibility for his former friend. When confronted by Hårgan elders the next day about the “disappearance” of the Rudi Radr, Christian throws Josh under the bus: “If he did take that book, I just pray you understand: we do not identify as friends of his, or collaborators, or anything. I certainly don't vouch for him and we'd be so embarrassed to be connected to this in any way.”
Of course, we know the text wasn’t stolen, as do the elders. They have the book, and Josh is buried elsewhere in the village, waiting for the final ritual. Yet, as Christian continues to shift the blame onto his close friend and colleague, Dani can only look on in silent disbelief.
Sins Laid Bear
In a final act that destroys his last connection to his previous life, Christian consummates his affair with Maja. After witnessing Dani’s ascension to the role of May Queen, he retaliates by willingly engaging in part of Maja’s love potion. Again, though the spiked water may relieve him of his inhibitions, he chooses to down the liquid, knowing exactly where his path will lead him.
Against a Hårgas woman’s warning, Dani peers through a keyhole and witnesses Christian and Maja having sex. A semicircle of maternal figures surround the two, moaning and groaning in unison with Maja’s pleasure, while just beyond the barrier of the house, Dani wails uncontrollably with a cluster of Hårgas women. Aside from the incredible juxtaposition of these two polar, unified expressions, the moaning and wailing that surround Dani and Christian serve as the final, unmerciful end to their relationship.
After he climaxes, Christian looks on in horror, as if he’s just now realized the repercussions of his behavior. Naked, yet futilely trying to cover himself, he scrambles from the ceremonial sex shed, but has nowhere to go. With no one to turn to and no place to hide, he is exposed in every sense of the word. To everyone, from the deceased Mark and Josh, to the Hårgas villagers, to the embittered Dani, Christian and all of his sins have been laid bare.
In an attempt to hide and regain some semblance of control, Christian ducks into a small shed. As he recomposes himself, he finds the dead (or near-dead) body of Simon (Archie Madekwe), another visitor of Hälsingland who had previously gone missing, strung up in a horizontal fashion, his eyes removed and replaced with flowers, his body contorted into the shape of a blood eagle—a brutal form of ritual execution described in the Sagas of late skaldic poetry.
The image is horrifying: Simon’s tortured body transformed into a symbol of retribution, an angel of death beckoning Christian. When Dani is dubbed May Queen, in an apparent drug-induced hallucination, the flowers on her crown begin to breathe in time with her. As she’s led to her victory feast, the flora all move in sync with her. And so, as Christian stares into the black center of Simon's flower eyes, we imagine Dani, in her newly found identity among the Hårgas, staring back at him.
Just as Christian turns to leave, he’s paralyzed by a Hårgas who’d snuck in after him. As an elder explains, he’s lost the capacity of his body—he cannot move, cannot blink, cannot speak. Expressionless and silent, Christian sits, slumped in a wheelchair, as Dani decides his fate as the ninth and final sacrifice. His physical paralysis in this moment reflects the indecision that had previously left him emotionally paralyzed, and the burning of the shed reflects the selfishness that emerged every time he finally chose to act, destroying each and every one of the relationships that had come to define him. In maiming those around him, he also maimed himself. Christian sits alone, awaiting the fate he’s earned in the film’s final moments, his identity now wholly erased. Stripped of all that he was and stitched into the corpse of a bear, he’s now part of something larger and uncaring towards him, an opportunity for ritualistic rebirth for Dani and the Hårgas.
As the temple burns, Dani watches on, surrounded by flowers and the Hårgas cries of jubilation. Flames envelop the room, and Christian stares blankly from the jaws of a bear. At last, his shape’s been lost, swallowed by the bear, swallowed by the fire. In its erasure of Christian’s identity, the fire has given Dani her shape, made space for her to be reborn from the ashes of their relationship.
