Breaking the Waves is a 1996 psychological drama film directed and co-written by Lars von Trier and starring English stage actress Emily Watson as her feature film acting debut, along with Stellan Skarsgård, a frequent collaborator with von Trier. Set in the Scottish Highlands in the early 1970s, it is about an unusual young woman and of the love she has for her husband, who asks her to have sex with other men when he becomes immobilised from a work accident. The film is an international co-production between Denmark and seven other European countries, while the former's involvement as his first film led by von Trier under his Danish company Zentropa. As von Trier's first film made after his founding of the Dogme 95 movement in 1995, it is heavily influenced by the movement's style and ethos. It is also the first film in Trier's Golden Heart Trilogy, which also includes The Idiots (1998) and Dancer in the Dark (2000), the former as a certified Dogme film. Breaking the Waves was well-received and has been described as "perhaps von Trier's most widely acclaimed film". The film won numerous awards including the Grand Prix at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival. Plot Bess McNeill is a young and pretty Scottish woman, who has, in the past, had treatment for unspecified mental health illness after the death of her brother. She marries oil rig worker Jan Nyman, a Danish non-churchgoer, despite disapproval from her community and her Free Scottish Presbyterian Calvinist church. Bess is steadfast and pure of heart, but quite simple and childlike in her beliefs. During her frequent visits to the church, she prays to God and carries on conversations with Him in her own voice, believing that He is responding directly through her. Bess is infatuated with Jan and has difficulty living without him when he is away on the oil platform. Jan makes occasional phone calls to Bess in which they express their love and sexual desires. Bess grows needy and prays for his immediate return. The next day, Jan is severely injured in an industrial accident and is flown back to the mainland. Bess believes her prayer was the reason the accident occurred, that God was punishing her for her selfishness in asking for him to neglect his job and come back to her. No longer able to perform sexually and mentally affected by the paralysis, Jan asks