Ever wondered around a museum scratching your chin, staring intensely at the art on display, and trying to appear as though you ‘get’ it?

Art is subjective, of course, but a new film called The Square is taking things a little further. It’s taking the piss out of “modern art pretentiousness and media sensationalism”, something Swedish director Ruben Östlund seems to have a knack for.

The film has already won this year’s Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, and some people are talking it up as an Oscar contender.

A quick run through from the Daily Beast before we watch the trailer:

…Östlund is at his best when not boxed in by external controls. Which is somewhat ironic, given that constraints are at the heart of The Square, which concerns well-to-do museum director Christian’s (Claes Bang) efforts to launch a new installation known as “The Square.”

Per its name, it’s an empty four-sided area on the ground, and its intent is to be a safe space that people can enter to find trust, aid, compassion, and understanding. Those elements are in short supply in the art world depicted here, as becomes obvious from Christian’s subsequent, sprawling story, which involves a stolen wallet that he tries to retrieve by threatening a lower-income apartment building’s tenants, a fraught sexual relationship with a reporter (Moss) that culminates with a fight over a used condom, and a marketing campaign for the project that goes horribly awry—courtesy of a PR video involving an exploding homeless girl.

Cringe, gape, shudder, laugh, repeat.

Go on, take the piss:

Sure, I’ll give it a watch.

That art is almost as pretentious as your influencer friend’s Instagram account.

[source:dailybeast]