She Suffered From Being Too Good
Breaking the Waves is the first film from Lars von Trier's Golden Heart Trilogy. Bess McNeill (Emily Watson) lives in a strict religious community in Scotland. She meets Jan (Stellan Skarsgård) — an outsider — and despite this, receives permission from the elders to marry him. We don't know a great deal about Jan. He works on an oil rig and doesn't speak much. Nevertheless, the couple seems genuinely happy. Very quickly, the viewer realises that Bess is different from everyone else around her.
Bess is wired in a very simple way, with only three variables: God, Love/Jan, and Community. With a history of mental illness on her record, she has focused on what she understands — God. She explains everything to herself through him. She was good, so he awarded her with love, the greatest prize of all. She prayed for Jan to return from the rig, and God sent him home — so what if he came back paralysed. When she doesn't follow instructions, God punishes her by worsening Jan's condition. The good old Old Testament, with all its martyrs, tests of faith, and painful obedience.
Bess's sister-in-law Dodo (Katrin Cartlidge) is the only person who recognises the true seriousness of her condition. She points this out to Jan, hoping he will use that knowledge with his wife's wellbeing in mind. Jan's following request — asking Bess to sleep with other men and come to him to describe it, believing it will somehow keep him alive — sets in motion events that neither Dodo nor Jan could have anticipated. They are both outsiders. They cannot conceive of someone so absolutely devoted to their faith that the majority of their energy goes toward finding links between their own actions and the will of God.
Bess continues her crusade convinced it is the only way to save Jan. The community banishes her. Jan signs papers to have her committed. The betrayed woman decides to sacrifice herself one final time.
Raped and beaten to death, she dies on a hospital bed. She throws one last look at Jan, speaks with her mother and sister-in-law, and finds closure. She dies happy that her death has meaning. Soon after, Jan walks again — thanks to Bess, undoubtedly. Whether his original request was driven by something evil, by the effects of strong drugs and brain surgery, or simply by a failure to understand his own wife — we will never know. Just as we will never know exactly what Bess suffered. Though the doctor's comment at the trial that followed her death offers a decent answer: she suffered from being too good.
The film is divided into seven chapters — Bess Gets Married, Life With Jan, Life Alone, Jan's Illness, Doubt, Faith, Bess' Sacrifice, The Funeral — each separated by interlude sequences of still images that carry the sentimental weight of Monet paintings, accompanied by Elton John, David Bowie, and Leonard Cohen. There is a mystery to these interludes. Something hidden in them that resists full explanation. Our brains, tuned to continuity, will always try to make the connections. Von Trier knows this, and leaves the gaps deliberately open.
She suffered from being too good. The doctor says it at her trial, almost as an aside. It is the most devastating line in the film.