‘Chaos reigns…’
Director: Lars von Trier
Cast: Charlotte Gainsbourg, Willem Dafoe
Plot: A grieving and dysfunctional couple retreat to a woodland hideaway to try and get over the death of their son. But Satanic nature has other plans…ones that include witchcraft, torture, genital mutilation, a bloody money-shot and a large pair of scissors.
You know you’re in for a rough ride when a film is divided into subsections with names like “Grief” “Pain” and “Despair”. ANTICHRIST (2009) is something of an oddity; it’s grotesque and beautiful, violent and bewitching – a weird but wonderful mix of horror meets avant-garde. The opening scene pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the film. She (Gainsbourg) and He (Dafoe) indulge in a lengthy bout of cinematic sex art-house style (all black and white and slow-motion) to the backdrop of Handel’s Lascia ch’io pianga while their toddler tumbles to his death from the upstairs window (you can tell it’s arty because they don’t have names). He’s a therapist, and decides to “cure” his wife of her depression himself rather than rely on the more conventional methods of modern medicine. His therapy seems to be lots of intense conversations followed by bouts of frantic sex (or sometimes the other way round). They retreat to “Eden” (a cabin in the woods) – but it’s too late. They can never get back to Paradise; Eve’s been tempted, the apple’s been eaten, and besides, She likes sex far too much (it’s not surprising ANTICHRIST has been dubbed misogynistic by some).
And it’s no wonder poor She has some serious carnal hang-ups. She ricochets between self-loathing, shame and more sex. One minute she’s jumping her husband’s bones, the next she’s asking him to hit her, or banging her head on the toilet basin. She wants to be punished for her complicity and negligence – either real or imagined – in her son’s death but at the same time She has opened herself up to the wild and uncontrollable aspects of nature. Is she possessed? Is Satan in the woods? Or is it more that she’s just been driven crazy with the guilt? Possibly. Her attacks on her husband are all sexual (Freud would have a field day). But it’s also true that nature is an unsettling element in ANTICHRIST. It invades, threatens and unnerves. He falls asleep with his hand dangling out the window and wakes with it covered in leprous looking ticks or growths. A deer trots by with a dead foetus dangling out of it, while a barely alive chick teeming with ants falls from a tree, before being gobbled up by a bird of prey. Aggressive acorns bombard their cabin, constantly crashing onto their roof with a machine-gun patter. Beatrix Potter it ‘aint. But if you come to ANTICHRIST expecting clear answers you’re going to be disappointed.
This film’s a real triumph of atmosphere. A colour palette of muted greens, blues and greys and some achingly ethereal cinematography means you don’t want to look away from the screen even for a second. But the chief effect is disorientation. Discontinuity editing, misaligned shot /reverse shots and a continual breaking of the 180-degree rule make the viewer feel completely disconcerted as well as showing us how far apart this couple really are from each other. He may think he knows his wife but He doesn’t have a clue. A clever use of silence and sound adds to the disorientation – long pauses, the sudden blast of wind rushing through the trees, the use of droning noise. This last technique brings to mind David Lynch’s TWIN PEAKS: FIRE WALK WITH ME and ERASERHEAD and I think ANTICHRIST owes a lot to Lynch in visual aesthetics too.
ANTICHRIST is visceral, ugly, brutal, but also hauntingly beautiful too. Challenging and infuriating, it’ll never give you answers, but instead leaves you with a series of uncanny and potent images. You’ll never look at a pair of kitchen scissors in the same way again.
Horror Highlights: Without a doubt the close-up of She lopping off her lady-bits with a large pair of kitchen scissors is the most squirm-inducing scene I’ve ever watched. And not to leave the lads out, there’s a shot of She slamming a large chunk of wood into He’s testicles. Get ready to cross your legs.
Terrifying Trauma: There’s something in the long grass…something awful. He reaches across and parts the blades to see a fox busy eating its own insides complete with a horrific ripping sound. Even worse, the fox…speaks… It’s quite a WTF moment in the history of modern cinema.
We’ll have another terror for you tomorrow at THN and you can view them all here.
