'Antichrist' Review
Just got back from watching Lars von Trier's latest, 'Antichrist', and I thought I'd put my thoughts down while they were still fresh in my head.
If there is one word to describe this movie it is 'provocative'. Von Trier pretty much proved this at Cannes by claiming to be the world's greatest filmmaker. He wants to rile you up. He wants you to walk out and ask for your money back. He would love it if you wrote into your local newspaper and complained about 'this sick filth'. He wants all these things because it means he has affected you, be it positively or negatively, he has caused you to react to what is essentially a fancy light show. And that is the essence of film as art.
Von Trier uses the tropes that you know from the horror world to created a study of grief, guilt, depression, and madness, and manages to wrap it in a fairly engaging plot regarding the two character's interactions and relationship. There has been a great deal of controversy surrounding the film's graphic depictions of sex and violence, which I consider to be unfounded considering the movie is squarely placed in the horror category. The imagery is simply taking that genre to the extreme. I personally feel that the main thesis of the film (that women are evil, the 'Antichrist' of the title) should be the thing grabbing headlines, not a little bit of sex and fake violence.
Like all the best horror, the slow pace of the film is used to great effect to ratchet up the tension between the two leads slowly throughout the film as they become more and more unhinged from reality, until the final 'climactic' payoff towards the end of the film. I don't mind admitting that my heart was thumping throughout, sometimes from shock at what I had just witnessed and other times in anticipation of what was to come.
Having said all that, I would not recommend this film to 90% of the population. The screening I was in was almost full and about six or seven people walked out during the course of the film and a lot more (perhaps most of the audience) seemed, shall we say, uncomfortable throughout. If you are at all squeamish or are easily upset or offended I strongly urge you to stay away, but if you are a lover of horror films and wish to see something uniquely terrifying and poignant then it is well worth the price of admission.
SPOILERS AHEAD
This is my personal interpretation of what happens in the the film and may be way off base.
The film begins with a couple having sex while their baby sleeps in the next room. While they are distracted the baby awakes and climbs onto an open window ledge, before falling to his death. The rest of the film takes place in a cabin in the woods where the man tries to help the woman work through her grief. Most synopses of the film claim that nature then begins attacking the couple, but that isn't what happens, instead the woman slowly appears to go mad and try to kill the man, with the possible assistance of nature although its unclear whether anything supernatural actually happens.
The woman gives birth to a child and begins suffering from post-natal depression which she hides from her therapist boyfriend for whatever reason. She begins to hate the child and in turn hate herself for feeling that way, so when the child dies (it is revealed that she could have stopped the child but chose not to) her guilt becomes all-consuming. She expresses a desire to die also but the man states he won't let that happen (he won't let her kill herself). Initially fearful of the cabin her fear subsides when she realizes what she must do, she must provoke the man into killing her. She pretends that she has come to believe that all women are evil during her research on Gynocide (the killing of women) and goes about demonstrating to the man that she in particular is evil by attacking him and doing/saying other terrible things. Eventually the man becomes convinced that she is evil (or possibly that all women are evil) and she gets her wish.
Here is what I think the message of the film is; women aren't evil, a woman is evil. Which can of course be expanded to people aren't evil, but a person can be evil.
SPOILERS END
I highly recommend the film to the right audience, it is rare that a film evokes such a strong reaction from me.
If there is one word to describe this movie it is 'provocative'. Von Trier pretty much proved this at Cannes by claiming to be the world's greatest filmmaker. He wants to rile you up. He wants you to walk out and ask for your money back. He would love it if you wrote into your local newspaper and complained about 'this sick filth'. He wants all these things because it means he has affected you, be it positively or negatively, he has caused you to react to what is essentially a fancy light show. And that is the essence of film as art.
Von Trier uses the tropes that you know from the horror world to created a study of grief, guilt, depression, and madness, and manages to wrap it in a fairly engaging plot regarding the two character's interactions and relationship. There has been a great deal of controversy surrounding the film's graphic depictions of sex and violence, which I consider to be unfounded considering the movie is squarely placed in the horror category. The imagery is simply taking that genre to the extreme. I personally feel that the main thesis of the film (that women are evil, the 'Antichrist' of the title) should be the thing grabbing headlines, not a little bit of sex and fake violence.
Like all the best horror, the slow pace of the film is used to great effect to ratchet up the tension between the two leads slowly throughout the film as they become more and more unhinged from reality, until the final 'climactic' payoff towards the end of the film. I don't mind admitting that my heart was thumping throughout, sometimes from shock at what I had just witnessed and other times in anticipation of what was to come.
Having said all that, I would not recommend this film to 90% of the population. The screening I was in was almost full and about six or seven people walked out during the course of the film and a lot more (perhaps most of the audience) seemed, shall we say, uncomfortable throughout. If you are at all squeamish or are easily upset or offended I strongly urge you to stay away, but if you are a lover of horror films and wish to see something uniquely terrifying and poignant then it is well worth the price of admission.
SPOILERS AHEAD
This is my personal interpretation of what happens in the the film and may be way off base.
The film begins with a couple having sex while their baby sleeps in the next room. While they are distracted the baby awakes and climbs onto an open window ledge, before falling to his death. The rest of the film takes place in a cabin in the woods where the man tries to help the woman work through her grief. Most synopses of the film claim that nature then begins attacking the couple, but that isn't what happens, instead the woman slowly appears to go mad and try to kill the man, with the possible assistance of nature although its unclear whether anything supernatural actually happens.
The woman gives birth to a child and begins suffering from post-natal depression which she hides from her therapist boyfriend for whatever reason. She begins to hate the child and in turn hate herself for feeling that way, so when the child dies (it is revealed that she could have stopped the child but chose not to) her guilt becomes all-consuming. She expresses a desire to die also but the man states he won't let that happen (he won't let her kill herself). Initially fearful of the cabin her fear subsides when she realizes what she must do, she must provoke the man into killing her. She pretends that she has come to believe that all women are evil during her research on Gynocide (the killing of women) and goes about demonstrating to the man that she in particular is evil by attacking him and doing/saying other terrible things. Eventually the man becomes convinced that she is evil (or possibly that all women are evil) and she gets her wish.
Here is what I think the message of the film is; women aren't evil, a woman is evil. Which can of course be expanded to people aren't evil, but a person can be evil.
SPOILERS END
I highly recommend the film to the right audience, it is rare that a film evokes such a strong reaction from me.
Comments