Dani Ardor is the main protagonist of Midsommar. She is portrayed by Florence Pugh.
Biography[]
Dani was a psychology student and the younger sister to Terri, who suffered from depression and had suicidal tendencies. She was in a relationship with Christian Hughes. The relationship between the two became distant overtime, and slowly turned toxic due to Christian gaslighting her on several occasions, to the point he was already planning on breaking up with her.
She became traumatized and distraught upon learning that her sister had killed her parents and herself with carbon monoxide, further straining her relationship with Christian. Six months later, she learns that he was planning a trip with his friends Josh and Mark to Sweden with their friend Pelle, who has invited them to attend a midsummer celebration. Even though she was unaware of the trip, Christian invites Dani to go with them, much to the annoyance of Josh and Mark, but confides in them that he believes she will not go. Despite still being quite emotionally affected, Dani decides to go on the trip, were they reach the village of Hårga.
During her stay, Dani continues to suffer crises and panic attacks that are worsened by psychedelics given by the cultists. She is frightened when elder cultists Ylva and Dan kill themselves. Later, when young Bror nearly sacrifices himself and only stops after Dani speaks out, she tries to warn Christian that she has realised that The Hårgas is a cult that relies on nobody ever finding out about its activities to carry on, but Christian gaslights her yet again, despite her very valid concerns. She ends up in a maypole dance competition and wins, being crowned the May Queen.
After catching Christian cheating on her with another girl from the village, Maja, Dani has another panic attack, but is comforted by the Hårga women as they wail with her in empathy.
Towards the final act of the film, the pagan cult makes the decision to sacrifice nine individuals, who will all die from being burned in the yellow building. Among the four is Christian, who had been drugged and paralyzed. Before the group proceeds with the ritual, they ask Dani whether or not they should sacrifice Christian. In a broken state, she ultimately agrees to go forward with this after seeing him have sex with Maja, having become bitter and heartbroken.
Christian is stuffed into a disemboweled bear and placed in the designated temple, alongside the still-living Ingemar, a second villager, and the ritualistically-prepared corpses of Josh, Mark, Simon, Connie, and the two elders. The temple is burned in an effort to purge the cult's evil.
As the cult celebrates the completion of their ritual, Dani sobs in horror, but gradually begins to smile, having finally found peace.