Melancholia illuminates the concept that the great unknown above reflects what is also mysterious below; that both the perfection and chaos expressed in the cosmos reflects the same perfection and chaos within us. Lars von Trier's Earth destroyed by the planet Melancholia could be a metaphor for the self-destruction of a human being suffering from severe depression. The bride tells her sister that she "knows" that there is no life elsewhere in the Universe; life exists only on the Earth. She says that if the Earth is destroyed, all life will be gone forever.
What could be more final than the destruction of all life in the Universe, and likewise, for an individual human being to commit the terrible and final act of suicide? Suicide is to the self, after all, nothing less than the absolute destruction of the self's experience of the Universe.
What could be more final than the destruction of all life in the Universe, and likewise, for an individual human being to commit the terrible and final act of suicide? Suicide is to the self, after all, nothing less than the absolute destruction of the self's experience of the Universe.