Sentimental Value Review: Art Imitates Heartbreak

I’ve had good luck with the first film I see at the Toronto International Film Festival each year. First it was Anatomy of a Fall, then The Girl with the Needle, and this past September, Sentimental Value. Fresh off winning the Grand Prix at Cannes — the festival’s second-most prestigious prize — Joachim Trier‘s latest arrived with enormous expectations. Seeing something so lauded right out of the gate can backfire; a few days into the festival crush, you might forget about it entirely. That didn’t happen here. This one stayed with me, settling deeper with each passing week.

Trier reunites with Renate Reinsve, whose breakout in The Worst Person in the World made her an instant international sensation, and together they’ve made something even stronger than that remarkably accomplished film. Reinsve plays Nora, an actress whose personal neuroses have curdled into paralyzing stage fright. Her younger sister Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) is married with a child, more willing to keep the door ajar for their father because she barely remembers what she was missing. When their mother dies, that estranged father — celebrated director Gustav Borg (Stellan Skarsgård, Dune) — resurfaces with a script in hand, a deeply personal project he wants Nora to star in. She refuses. The role goes instead to Rachel Kemp (Elle Fanning, The Neon Demon), a Hollywood star hungry to be taken seriously.

What follows is an explosive, emotionally intricate drama about the blurred lines between art and exploitation, memory and manipulation. Is Gustav’s script about his mother, who committed suicide when he was seven? His ex-wife? His daughters? The answer keeps shifting, and Trier holds you in suspense, breath held, for nearly the entire runtime. There’s cutting wit throughout, but nothing feels forced or phony. Every charged exchange lands with devastating precision.

The performances are staggering across the board. Reinsve (Armand) is unforgettable — from the harrowing opening sequence where Nora sabotages her own stage performance to her raw confrontations with a father who dispenses microaggressions like party favors. Skarsgård, an actor who seems to work constantly, delivers far and away his most impressive work here; Trier even incorporates clips from his early career for a TV interview, blurring the line between performer and character.

But the revelation is Lilleaas, whose Agnes functions as both mother figure and wounded sibling to Nora. She internalizes so much of the dialogue that it emerges not just in words but in her eyes, in small shifts of posture — the way we shake off feelings that go unsaid or swallow hurts we decide aren’t worth naming. It’s so naturalistic you frequently forget you’re watching a movie. Fanning, meanwhile, feels rediscovered here, finding something special in a role that could have been merely decorative. Even in smaller turns, like the gorgeous and sincere Lena Endre (The Master), everyone brings their full selves.

Cinematographer Kasper Tuxen captures the family home as both sanctuary and battleground, its walls thick with memory. Editor Olivier Bugge Coutté shifts between time periods and surreal asides with graceful confidence, while Jørgen Stangebye Larsen‘s production design makes that house feel like a character unto itself. Costume designer Ellen Dæhli Ystehede draws sharp distinctions — flashy public glamour for Fanning, baggy shapelessness for Nora in her downtime, a corseted dress tied so tight she can barely breathe on opening night. And as he did with The Worst Person in the World, Trier demonstrates an impeccable ear for music, opening and closing with Terry Callier’s haunting “Dancing Girl.“

I’ve seen Sentimental Value twice now, and I suspect it will only grow richer with each viewing. The story feels so intimate and specific that it might not seem immediately relatable — but themes of connection, forgiveness, showing up, and knowing your own value will resonate deeply with anyone who has felt stung by absence, hearing only an echo return when their rawest emotions are spoken aloud.