Antichrist (2009) is a creepy movie oozing with sex, nudity, violence and craziness but, at the end of the day, it is Lars von Trier at his best!
Bear in mind that Lars Von Trier made this film while battling a depression, and watching this movie is like taking a private tour into the dark sides and corners of the mind of this brilliant Danish director.
Remind you that Lars Von Trier introduced the grainy images and hand-held photography in cinema, which became known as the Dogme concept. Von Trier's used this technique in films such as Breaking the Waves, from 1996, which won the Grand Prix at Cannes. And again in Dancer in the Dark featuring the Icelandic singer Björk, who won the Best Actress Award at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival for her performance in the film.
Antichrist is about a couple, played by Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsburg, who lose their young son as he falls out the window while they are caught up in a sex act. The mother's grief is so strong that she ends up at a hospital, but her therapist husband brings her home with the intention of treating her depression himself.
© Zentropa EntertainmentTo confront her fears, they go to stay at a remote small cabin in the woods, 'Eden', where something untold happened the previous summer. Told in four chapters with a prologue and epilogue, the film unfolds the darker sides of human nature that deal with lust and cruelty, which 'Eden' seems to bring out in the couple.
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I loved the film for exploring new realms of the mind. It's very provocative and very beautiful.
ReplyDeleteI agree with most of what Tina Beattle writes (the text Pat posted). I don't think the film is a simple act of misogynism. Trier is probably just trying to expose or show us the deeply rooted gender structures of Christian culture, even present Western culture. He is not judging, simply showing. However...
Trier might not be judging, but a film always tells a story from a certain perspective. That is obvious and nothing is wrong with that! But I don't believe that a film can ever be a neutral representation. Whether Trier is aware of it or not, the film has a message.
The film has a message (which might vary from viewer to viewer, of course) because it is a deliberate combination with a particular angle. Things are included, things are left out as always. It has an angle.
As Beattle writes:
"Von Trier might only tell half the story, but it is the half which has too often been allowed to define the whole in the history of western religion and culture."
Trier tells the same story that was told in the Bible. In that sense, he is not being critical or trying out new perspectives. Peace be with that.
But the question is: why feed the reproduction of cultural stereotypes? And why make such statement in year 2010?
Maybe to make us realize that women are still considered as more irrational and evil than men...?
As Beattle wrote, we as viewers are used to watching horror films with men torturing (raping) women but in this film we see the opposite. For some reason that is very provocative.
Maybe Trier is actually a feminist. That would be so cool.
Ida