Shedding the Light on Dogville

The use of light, and the discussion of light is a key element to the plot of Dogville. Light is used to show the difference between humanity and a human’s instinctual animalism of the characters. Grace arrives in Dogville at night unnoticed until she steals Moses’ bone. In this darkened atmosphere she meets Tom, who overlooks Grace’s animalistic act and decides to try and help her.

Grace’s character is so infatuated with Dogville because she sees it as a town of light in comparison to the dark animalistic world she is running from. When she arrives in town “the light changes”. Nietzsche believes that a strong person who chooses to be weak is not acting properly. A strong person should act and protect themselves, and Grace forsakes her past animalistic lifestyle in order to be weak. She continually lets the other townspeople, whom Nietzsche might at first consider weak sheep, to use her. In her offer to help them, they eventually evolve into the birds of prey that take advantage of Grace’s morals. When Grace attempts to escape the townspeople she is loaded into the darkness of a transportation truck. Within this darkness Grace hopes for the best- looks to the future. Along the way, Ben attacks Grace as “payment” for giving her a ride. The next time she sees light again she has been returned to Dogville, having given payment to Ben for nothing.

Grace’s relationship with Jack McKay is probably the best example of light representing animalistic nature, and the dark being weakness. Jack is blind, and during his polite conversations with Grace he often talks about things he remembers seeing. Grace’s relationship to Jack is based upon her feeling of obligation to provide some sort of service to everyone in town because they are keeping her “safe”. At one point Grace decides to show her true face to Jack when she blatantly points out his blindness in the cruelest way. She forcibly opens the curtains in his apartment to put Jack in the uncomfortable position of having to admit to his blindness. He knows that she is being cruel. Once the windows are open wide and the light floods in is when Jack realizes that Grace, too, has a cruel side. Their relationship has fundamentally changed, and Jack participates in the men’s harassment and molestation as part of Grace’s payment to the town.

When Grace finally chooses between her old life of unashamed animalistic nature, and Dogville’s ashamed animal nature, she has a moment of clarity when the moon’s light reveals Dogville for what it has become. She realizes that they don’t deserve to be forgiven. She owes them the pain they caused her, and she intends to use her power and act. A dog’s behavior can be modified, and in this town of dogs Grace decides to act and then forget. She watches as the town burns, and then moves on from Dogville.