Songs from the Second Floor

Synopsis

Across forty-six meticulously staged, deadpan static wide tableaus rendered in chalky, desaturated tones, a modern European city collapses under the weight of financial catastrophe, endless gridlocked traffic jams where businessmen whip themselves like medieval flagellants, a furniture merchant who burns down his store for insurance money, and corporate executives who sacrifice an innocent schoolgirl off a cliff to appease the market gods. Roy Andersson's Cannes Special Jury Prize-winning absurd masterpiece.