It’s fairly safe to say that by now, the Hollywood musical hasstiffened in the throes of rigor mortis.

Though Woody Allen and Kenneth Branagh have attempted todefibrillate the form in recent years, the biggest problem themusical faces in the year 2000 is a lack of happy-go-lucky viewerswilling to hop and skip over to the drive-in to enjoy one. Today’sshock-savvy audience would be more at home with an anti-Hollywood,anti-musical.

And now, we have one.

As the winner of this year’s Palme D’or, the top prize at theCannes Film Festival, “Dancer in the Dark” can stand proudlyalongside past recipients (“The Conversation,” “Barton Fink” and”Pulp Fiction” to name a few) as a groundbreaking film that is unlikeanything you’ve ever seen.

Danish director Lars Von Trier, whose work is consistently thesubject of love-it-or-hate-it controversy, continues in the mold ofprovocateur extraordinnaire with “Dancer,” a thoroughly ironic yetheart-wrenching deconstruction of the musical.

“Dancer” is completely infused with the sensibilities of its star,Bj