Monthly Archive for February, 2010

I missed Antichrist at the film festival and in its limited cinematic release. I admit that a few times I had occasion to see it but was scared off by what I’d read. So it was from the safety of the couch that I approached writer/director Lars von Trier’s (Dogville, Dancer in the Dark) polarising, scandalous work. It is the first DVD I’ve ever seen with a warning across the top in addition to the R rating for high impact violence and sexual activity emblazoned across the bottom.

It has been reported that von Trier wrote the film during a period of deep depression. The result is a melancholy meditation on guilt and grief, explored through only two characters. The subject matter is intense in its own right, and is magnified by the chemistry between the leads – Charlotte Gainsbourg (The Science of Sleep, 21 Grams) as the grieving mother (or Eve/Madonna according to some readings); and Willem Dafoe (Shadow of the Vampire, eXistenZ) her therapist husband (Man/Mankind) who seeks to console her. Von Trier uses only their interactions, visceral and confronting as they are, to explore his subject.

The prologue contains no dialogue and is presented in slow motion. The alarming juxtaposition of events is portrayed like a dance set to a Handel Aria and sets the tone for a film as beautiful as it is disturbing. The limited focus of the story takes us on a very personal journey through these raw emotions and is highly effective in doing so.

The brutality for which the film is famous is an extension of this journey and is not out of place. Shocking, yes and difficult to watch, yet quite brief. It is the motivation for and outcome of the acts that are more important. From the uproar it received I was expecting misogynistic violence for its own sake, drawn out and gratuitous. Instead von Trier forces us to question our morals, guilt and the limits of our acceptance.

Far from the ‘torture porn’ of films such as Eden Lake or the Saw franchise, the savagery of Antichrist serves only to emphasise von Trier’s point and ensure that we grasp its gravity. Like the narrative itself, only key moments of violence are shown. This technique endears me greatly and makes the film far more powerful. Rather than wade through the mundanity of the couple’s quotidian, it’s all killer, no filler. The sweeping photography and artistic mood soften the pace just enough so as to keep the audience enthralled.

The film will certainly not be to everyone’s taste. Its brutality is not something to which Hollywood audiences have been desensitised. These moments are however brief enough to make the film quite watchable and commendable in fact for successfully crossing these lines in a palatable fashion.

Antichrist engages various weighty subjects including Christian guilt and the creation myth, anti/feminism, gynocide, and society’s preoccupation with therapy. An essay could be written on each of these and it is for this that I am so intrigued by von Trier’s work. He has effectively produced a film that can be appreciated on many levels, the least of which is a beautiful but terrifying thriller.