Commentary on Movies and TV by Brian Holcomb

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

The ANTI-CHRIST is Coming!


Lars von Trier's Antichrist - Official Trailer from Zentropa on Vimeo.

“I would like to invite you for a tiny glimpse behind the curtain, a glimpse into the dark world of my imagination: into the nature of my fears, into the nature of Antichrist.” LARS VON TRIER

Well, if that doesn't sound just like the opening of Garth Marenghi's Darkplace! Like Werner Herzog, It's ALWAYS hard to tell if Von Trier is kidding.



It's been awhile since we've heard from Von Trier and this film has certainly had its production troubles. But from the looks of it, it seems that Von Trier has crafted a film somewhat closer in style to his early works like The Element of Crime than the dogme and pseudo-dogme approach taken from The Kingdom onward. It also reminds me of Ingmar Bergman's Hour of the Wolf in its mix of isolation, psychodrama, and surrealistic imagery.

But that remains to be seen...

This is the plot as offered in a press release from Zentropa: A couple lose their little son, and the wife subsequently suffers from terrible anxiety attacks. Her husband is a therapist, and in spite of warnings not to treat people with whom you have close relations, they begin to tackle her fears together, and in the place where her anxiety is strongest: Eden, a deserted cabin in the woods.

The tough therapeutic struggle develops into a battle of the sexes. Her fears inhabit them both, and even he is not exempt from experiencing the merciless evil of nature. Natural brutality takes over and his cool reason is rendered futile. The evil in her runs wild.

7 comments:

Ant Honey said...

Putting it on my netflix... danke...

Brian said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Brian said...

Right on Ishmael. I can call you Ishmael, right?

glenn said...

This preview looks both interesting and boring in the same exact breath...designed, by nature, to contradict itself with a slurry of repentant dialogue and character revelations(via well crafted film making) that metaphorically proclaim the woman, mother, to be the anti-christ due to her murdering her own child. Although I am not very familiar with Von Trier's work, this seems to be a character piece disguised as a supernatural tale. Unfortunately, like all costume parties, somewhere in the second act...when the clock chimes 12, the disguise must come off and this movie will turn into a pumpkin...or something like that.

If DePalma was to direct this, the supernatural would be prevalent, never attempting to be anything more than it is, but I seem to think it might be the opposite in this film...let's hope it's not?

glenn said...

Must add that my predictions in my previous comment has little and nothing to do with any knowledge about the actual plot of the film just assumptions, made on my part based on the trailer. But like all assumptions...I'm an ass...or something like that.

Brian said...

Like all of Von Trier's stuff it will probably be amazing and annoying all at once. His best stuff is VERY hard to forget, intense as well as startingly, sickly funny. This angry, punk humor saves him from pretentiousness. We'll see. You're right, this is not really a genre picture in terms of A,B,C so on those terms it may be boring-while still being scary, the end of his film EPIDEMIC is pretty damn scary stuff and ELEMENT OF CRIME is creepy throughout, full of weird nightmare imagery. The thing is that he won't make it psychological, it'll be demons and ghosts up there if that's what it's about.

glenn said...

That's good to know...I plead ignorance when it comes to Von Trier...I should put some of his films on my queue.