Movie Review: Antichrist
Written by Grady Fiorio Original Publishing Date: October 27th, 2023 Rating: 5/5
Chaos reigns
Do you ever wonder about the empty place inside? The place where pain, despair, and suffering live? Where that uncontrollable sense of fear and panic starts to take over as if they were controlling you right at the brainstem. Where guilt brews like a cauldron and sadness permeates through your skin like a heavy coat made of iron. It’s dark, cold, and damp, but with time, we can be reborn. Helmed by controversial Danish director Lars Von Trier, Antichrist follows the tragic tale of a couple that loses a child to an unforeseen accident during a moment of passion. This tragedy soon spirals out of control as the couple tries to confront their grief in a secluded cabin in the woods. Starring Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg as the nameless He and She, Antichrist explores guilt, love, sex, and the crushing vice grip of depression.
Von Trier is a director I’ve been wanting to cover for a while now. Even before I saw any of his films, I found myself captivated by his cinematic style and provocateur. Known for covering hot topics in a very raw and unconventional style, Von Trier’s name was always passed around in film circles like a bad word. But like any bad word worth hiding, it only drew more attention. As I finally started to take the plunge into his work, I found that there was something much deeper under the surface. His films were deeply emotional and mind-opening, which is odd because Von Tier embraces many of the filmmaking qualities I dislike. High shutter, handheld cinematography, frantic editing, jumping the 180, continuity errors, inconsistent jump cutting, lack of spatial awareness, and a general sense of visual and emotional chaos. To add to this, he stitches together multiple takes, where he gives his actors wildly different directions to create said sense of chaos, while also altering the passage of time. Under a less skilled director, it would come off as a visual noise smeared across a garbage frame, but somehow Von Trier finds the emotion in it all, grounding everything else. He also knows when to stop the shakiness and focuses his cinematography on stunning visuals that mesmerize even his biggest detractors. I find his film Europa to be particularly unique as it utilizes old-school rear projection in a completely new and revolutionary way that I haven’t seen before or since. It also pioneered the black, white, and red cinematic look that Sin City would popularize 14 years later.
Unsurprisingly, Antichrist is also a showcase for Von Trier’s technical pioneering. The film was shot digitally, using RED’s first set of digital cinema cameras. Von Trier has always been one to embrace the use of digital cinema, but something about the clean look of Antichrist makes it unique for a digitally shot film when the technology was still in its relative infancy. The film is also famous for its use of the Phantom camera, shooting slow-motion shots at 1000 frames per second. It gives the film a look that is wholly unique to the vision of Von Trier and hasn’t ever been replicated since.
While technically impressive, Von Trier also continues to challenge himself thematically. The first part of his depression trilogy, Antichrist is only one of three parts. While the trilogy is not literally connected, it is thematically linked, similar to Kieślowski’s Three Colors trilogy, Blue, White, and Red. Von Trier’s trilogy is comprised of Antichrist, Melancholia, and Nymphomaniac. All films examine different forms of grief, depression, and obsession, with lead characters that are personifications of Von Trier himself. All three films also star Charlotte Gainsbourg in what are unequivocally her most impressive and vulnerable performances to date. Adding to its thematic depth, Antichrist is Von Trier’s most personal film. He’s gone on record discussing his long struggle with depression and alcoholism, and how he nearly quit filmmaking during the production of Antichrist. In the film, it’s apparent how he manifests that sense of guilt, destruction, and depression, and continues those themes throughout the trilogy.
Like the director himself, Antichrist is nothing short of controversial (if you haven’t noticed by now, a favorite genre of mine). At its 2009 Cannes premiere, the film became infamous for its incredibly violent and disturbing third act. A section of the film that garnered the film mass boos, walkouts, and incredible praise. It’s bold, brash, and I’d expect nothing less from Von Trier. The film was also attacked by Christian film group, The Ecumenical Jury, who gave the film an “anti-award” for "the most misogynist movie from the self-proclaimed biggest director in the world." Poking fun at his own controversy, Von Trier offered the film to distributors in two separate versions at the Cannes Film Market. The “Catholic” and “Protestant” versions. The former version was censored while the latter version was left uncut. Von Trier might have a few screws loose but he’s never lost his sense of humor. As someone who grew up Catholic, I certainly got a kick out of it. The film was also met with a near-even split of 54 and 55 percent scores on Rotten Tomatoes. While controversy is nothing new for Von Trier, Antichrist is a film that refuses to be ignored.
So what makes Antichrist such an unavoidably abrasive film? Well, just about all 108 minutes of it. The film is infamous for its graphic depictions of violence and sex, often intertwining the two. From the opening scene, the film pulls no punches. With the main plot revolving around the death of a child and a subplot about the occult, there is no way that Antichrist would go unnoticed, especially by overzealous Christian groups. The film also faced much backlash with many claims of misogyny, often citing the violence Gainsbourg suffers and inflicts as the main source. However, this is a claim that always left me confused. In my reading of Von Trier’s films, he has always had great sympathy for his female characters, who more often than not lead his films. While Gainsbourg certainly leaves the film brutalized, never once did I get the impression that Von Trier was punching down on her. I never saw her characterization as a slight against her womanhood, but rather just as a character in great loss and mourning. Von Trier even states in the director’s commentary that she is a direct stand-in for himself. Depression is not a gendered issue, and to not give an honest account of his experience would be a disservice to those who have struggled. This is a film about people and pain, and for it to be honest and real, it must be felt. By the standard of the film’s critics, Von Trier must hate men too because Dafoe sure does get a raw deal from a block of wood near the film’s third act. If you know, you know.
Like its polarizing reaction, my relationship with Antichrist is quite complex. I originally saw the film five years ago as part of a “Fucked Up Movie Marathon” I had with a close friend. At said event, we watched A Serbian Film Uncut, Salò, Pink Flamingos, and Antichrist, in that order (You can read more about my experience with Salò by clicking here). To be honest, at first viewing, I thought Antichrist was trash. My opinion was that the first and last 10 minutes were fun, batshit crazy, Lars Von Trier filmmaking, but everything in-between plus the epilogue was boring nonsense. However, like many of Von Trier’s films, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. In Von Trier’s fan circle, it was often considered his masterpiece, and I just didn’t understand. After having the film and its elusive ending rack my brain like a high-scoring game of pinball, I knew that at some point or another, I was going to have to revisit it. That day finally came on one late night in September.
The year was 2021, and at the time, I had recently moved to Los Angeles and was making the rounds to just about every art house theater I could find. Like many fans of the art house scene in Los Angeles, I eventually found myself at the American Cinematheque, a film preservation society that hosts screenings across Hollywood at the Los Feliz, Aero, and Egyptian theaters. Every late September/ early October, the American Cinematheque hosts Beyond Fest, a film festival dedicated to both new and classic genre films, mostly specializing in horror films. To my surprise, that year Beyond Fest was not only hosting a midnight screening of Antichrist, but it was free. Finally, I could indulge in my masochistic movie taste with a random group of strangers at midnight. While the American Cinematheque was hosting their trauma marathon, further south in Santa Ana, another arthouse favorite of mine, The Frida Cinema, was hosting a Soviet September-themed movie month, featuring classics such as Come and See, and Solaris. Fun for the whole family. On that last day of September, they were hosting their final screening of Andrei Tarkovsky’s Stalker (another film I need to rewatch, and will probably write about in the future). With two film-going opportunities in hand, I knew what I had to do. I decided to embark on one of the most psycho double features known to man, Stalker + Antichrist. To sweeten the pot even further, the next day was followed by a screening of Titane, hosted by director Julia Ducournau herself at the Landmark Theatre on Pico Boulevard (Sadly now shut down. It was one of the best theatres in town), but that’s another story for another time.
The day began in Santa Ana at 4:00 p.m. for Stalker. While I’ll save most of the details for another time, needless to say, it was a hell of a movie, if not a bit slow. This was followed by a much-needed break until around 10:00 p.m. At that point, I made my way to Los Feliz for Antichrist at midnight. Tickets were on a first come first serve basis, and I wasn’t gonna let anybody take my front-row seat for mental scarring. I even still have my ticket stub from that night. At about 11:50 p.m. the usher came in and introduced the film. He asked how many of us had not already seen the film, to which about 60% of the crowd raised their hands. Less than I was expecting, but still nice to know that I was going in with a mostly blind crowd. After wishing us good luck, the usher left and the lights dimmed. What followed was a trailer for Beyond Fest, then capped off with the 20th Century Fox logo video. Except this wasn’t the real logo video, but a parody. Complete with a poorly done flute rendition of the trumpet fanfare and an altered logo that read “Y’all Motherfuckers Need Jesus”. An apt and quite accurate statement for what was to follow. As the film finally started, and my excitement began to peak, I found myself reintroduced to Lars Von Trier’s Antichrist.
Once the credits rolled, the lights went up, and people left in a combined state of shock, fear, and nervous laughter, I couldn’t help but find myself thinking “Man, what a difference a rewatch makes.” I had completely 180’d from my original opinion of the movie. Not only do I now love the film, but I believe it to be one of the greatest movies ever made. In my rewatch of the film, what I originally saw as boring filmmaking, was now a raw examination of grief as a self-destructive force. How love and intimacy can become corrupted by our self-hatred and guilt. Our perception of sex can become so easily and violently skewed due to our past traumas. Despite the film’s over-the-top and indulgent moments, it’s littered with truths on what makes the mind attack itself. Dafoe and Gainsbourg absolutely bring it home with career-best performances, becoming the most vulnerable I have ever seen two actors on screen. Completely intertwined. Gainsbourg’s performance even got her the Best Actress Award at Cannes. With every scene more gut-wrenching and emotionally devastating than the last, Lars Von Trier indeed created his masterpiece with Antichrist.
So what is it that makes Antichrist so special? Well, like any good story, we need to start at the beginning. The film opens with its most beautifully tragic scene. After one of Von Trier’s famous chapter markers, the opera song Lascia Ch'io Pianga (“Leave that I might weep”) starts to slowly fade in. We are then introduced to Dafoe and Gainsbourg’s nameless He and She. During a late snowy night, the couple engages in intense (and classically Von Trier) graphic shower sex. In this moment of passion, their sleeping toddler Nic, is awakened by his bedroom window swinging open in the cold winter air. Feeling adventurous, Nic takes his teddy bear, hops out of his crib, and goes to explore. As the couple takes their own adventure to their separate bedroom, Nic finds himself entranced by his open window, seemingly calling to him. As the couple’s sex becomes feverishly intense, Nic finds himself climbing higher and higher, until he’s standing right on the edge of an open three-story ledge. Seemingly now lacking the climbing skills that got him there in the first place, there’s only one way but down. As he slowly goes into free fall, Nic lets go of his teddy bear. This is then intercut with the literal climax of Dafoe and Gainsbourg, as Nic collides with the ground. All that’s left is a small lifeless body encased in snow.
So you’re probably thinking to yourself at this point “Wow, that’s fucked up!” Which you’d be right. Despite this seemingly egregious scene, something is brewing under the surface. On a purely technical level, this scene is perfect. Every composition is staged masterfully, with beams of light cutting across the screen, beautifully contrasting the black-and-white cinematography, all in super slow motion that would make Zack Snyder blush. The operatic music beautifully complements the imagery, as we must sit in horror and watch something so terrible, photographed so beautifully. It’s a clear juxtaposition that works on both a technical and thematic level. It may be on the nose, but I’ll be damned if it doesn’t work great. The baby bedroom windows open like the cold frozen gates of hell. Finally culminating in great ecstasy and great tragedy. A horrific death followed by “the little death”. It’s like its own perfect little short film. Exactly setting the tone, this opening scene is one of the best of all time and is a testament to Von Trier’s skill as a filmmaker.
Almost equally as gut-punching is the film’s next scene, Nic’s funeral. Von Trier stages this with a single shot. We follow the funeral procession from the inside of the hearse, as the camera rests atop a child-sized casket. Seeing Dafoe’s silent scream, going completely unheard by his now lost child, followed by the collapse of Gainsbourg, perfectly encapsulates the unmitigated tragedy of a parent losing a child. While brief, Von Trier creates a deceptively simple stage to even further push the viewer into heartbreak. Besides the opening, it’s the scene I think about the most.
These opening scenes act as a serving platter for grief, immediately setting you in the mind of these characters. Honestly, I don’t know how you could find a way to manage during a time like that. I’m not a parent, but holy shit, even as someone on the sideline that seems unbearable. It would be something so unimaginably crushing that it would suck you into a complete vortex of despair, and that’s what it does to our leads. Gainsbourg in particular. While Dafoe has been able to somewhat get his bearings, Gainsbourg has become nearly paralyzed by her grief and burdened by a mysterious feeling of fear. As Gainsbourg’s grief grows, so do her sexual urges. The sex becomes more intense, violent, and compulsive. A ritualistic act that needs to be checked off like a box, not an act of passion. This is where Antichrist first starts to develop one of its central themes of guilt as a weapon. Gainsbourg now associates sex with loss and guilt. It simultaneously becomes a distraction from the pain as well as an atonement for feeling pleasure during a horrific accident, for which she blames herself. The only way to atone is to turn that pleasure into pain.
Like grief, weaponized guilt is very real, and it sneaks up on you in ways you don’t expect. As a kid, it’s something I struggled with deeply, and even as an adult, it’s still something I’ve had to learn to adapt to. I’ve struggled my whole life with anxiety, often stemming from some greater force that seems to be undefinable. Sometimes it feels like there is just this dark cloud hovering over me, where it’s too dark to see tomorrow. Oftentimes this would manifest as guilt. A feeling of guilt that was often completely unfounded, and came from a string of ridiculous thoughts that would fall like 10-foot-tall dominos. It often felt like I was being judged for every action and every thought, even when unintentional and intrusive. Now it probably didn’t help that at Catholic school my third-grade teacher went through a detailed list of all the ways you can (and will) go to hell. But hey, if you can’t instill the fear of God’s wrath into a bunch of 8-year-olds, are you even doing the whole Catholic thing right? It got so bad that at one point the local church priest had to talk to me to convince me that I wasn’t going to burn in hell for occasional intrusive thoughts. Looking back, it sounds like a rejected episode of Seinfeld, but it’s the truth. When left unchecked, feelings of guilt eat at us like a monster hiding under the bed. But hey, even if I do end up in hell with a bunch of 8-year-olds, they’re probably a cooler bunch than the group of people mixing times tables with eternal damnation.
Hellfire and silent reading time aside, it’s important to recognize that guilt can often manifest itself into even larger feelings of fear. The undefinable force that permeates itself throughout our lives. This is something that Antichrist explores in great depth once again through Gainsbourg. This sense of fear is a driving force for Antichrist. Acting as both a thematic and narrative catalyst, pushing us into the mysterious forest of Eden, where the heart of the film takes place. This is where the couple tries to take on Gainsbourg’s fear head-on, in a type of exposure therapy. In this forest retreat, the couple spends their days at a family cabin where Gainsbourg would vacation with Nic. However, this place of joy has now become a tainted memory, where evil brews beneath the grass. As the couple takes their journey into the forest they find themselves greeted by increasingly strange phenomena, where fear becomes personified into reality. Grass that burns the feet, the disembodied voice of Nic, arms that come from the root of a tree during a sexual encounter, and most famously, a self-cannibalizing fox that clearly speaks the words “Chaos reigns”. This is where the narrative and allegory start to collide in what has been one of the biggest criticisms and praises of the film. Nature becomes a representation of pain, despair, and suffering, or as the film describes it, the Three Beggars. Represented through a crow (despair), a deer (grief), and a fox (pain). It is described prophetically throughout the film that a meeting of the Three Beggars will result in a death. In these strange moments, Gainsbourg finds herself descending further into madness as Dafoe tries to keep her at bay. Try as he might, the pull of evil is much too strong.
For the longest time, I didn’t understand the title. It always felt like a shoo-in. There’s no “Antichrist” type monster or creature in the film. Originally, I thought the Antichrist referred to the child (fucked up, I know). My only real reasoning was because, during the opening scene before the child falls out the window, he looks to the camera and gives a sinister grin as if he somehow knows what he’s doing and the repercussions it will have. I also thought a lot about the panic attack scenes where Gainsbourg is shot in a hyperfocused manner. Her every move and breath fixated in extreme detail. In these moments she discusses ideas of abstract fear that don’t seem to come from one place, rather it’s an aura that surrounds her. A rain with no visible cloud. Maybe that’s the Antichrist? The invisible force of evil that pushes us all. That unknowing force that infuses darkness into our lives.
However, I finally understood the meaning behind the title when listening to an old interview between Mark Kermode and Willem Dafoe on the Channel 5 Live broadcast. While Dafoe himself even admitted to not understanding the title, in a slew of random ideas, he threw out various possible interpretations. The discussion of nature came up, and it finally made sense. Nature is the Antichrist in Antichrist. These nameless characters (He and She) are sent to the antithesis of the Garden of Eden. These biblical illusions are laid out throughout the entirety of the film. There are hints of this during the film’s cutaways and more surreal moments like the deer with a half-birthed stillborn and the aforementioned talking fox. Instead of a land of everlasting peace, it’s a land of everlasting evil. Heaven on Earth, Hell on Earth. The Antichrist. In this twisted garden of Eden, nature is harboring an evil. Something that lies between the grass, consumed by the animals and flowing through the roots of the trees.
For this next section, I’m going to be talking about the film’s ending and going into spoilers. At this point, it goes without saying that I love the film and think it’s a masterpiece of cinema. That being said, while I do “recommend” Antichrist, it is an incredibly violent, graphic, and emotionally disturbing film. This is a full-on batshit, European, art-house movie and It’s not going to be for everyone. It’s something you should understand before watching. If you’re still interested in the film, but feel that it might not be to your taste, I recommend that you continue reading further and see my own personal insights into what I believe the film is trying to reveal. Just know that it only gets much more R rated from here. Now with the warning out of the way, this is where shit gets real.
After an undetermined amount of days in the forest of Eden, with talking foxes, scattered drawings of ritualistic sacrifices, and voices coming through the woods, Gainsbourg becomes convinced that Dafoe is planning to ditch her in the woods. Going full crazy mode, she attacks Dafoe with a large wooden log, in what is the most leg-crossing scene for any man watching the film. After fully knocking him out and engaging in some serious fucked up date night activities, she uses an old-school hand drill to drill a hole in his leg and attach a large grindstone. Feeling conflicting feelings of guilt and anger, Gainsbourg runs off into the trees to catch her breath. When Dafoe finally awakes, both he and Gainbourg engage in a classic cat-and-mouse game of “try to unscrew this grindstone from my leg while my wife tries to kill me”.
After a back and forth of exchanged blows, the couple finds themselves back inside the cabin within inches of their life. As Gainsbourg tries to sexually engage Dafoe one last time, she has a flashback to the beginning of the film, seeing her son fall out of the window as she has sex with her husband. Sending her into a state of complete destruction, Gainsbourg self-mutilates in the film’s most infamous and talked about scene. As Gainsbourg slowly bleeds in silence, three animals approach her side. The Three Beggars. In her moment of silent suffering, Dafoe finds a wrench and removes the grindstone. With an animalistic sense of fight or flight, that mimics the scenes of Gainbourg’s panic attacks from the beginning of the film, Dafoe takes matters into his own hands. He strangles Gainsbourg, completing the prophecy and resulting in death. It’s a shocking moment, but not for the reason you might think. While trying to constantly help his wife throughout the entire film, Dafoe is taken hold of by the darkness. The only way to save himself from evil is to embrace it, becoming the thing he was trying to save his wife from. Outside of the cabin, Dafoe burns Gainbourg’s body in a funeral pyre. Making his final steps away from the forest, the surrounding image of nature and trees slowly begins to morph into bodies and limbs.
Now for the most illusive scene of the film, the epilogue. Shot in black and white, with Lascia Ch'io Pianga playing, matched to the opening prologue, Dafoe walks his way up a hill in the sunlight. Eating berries and picking at the grass, he is greeted by the Three Beggars sitting in the grass. All translucent. They keep their distance but give Dafoe a look of acknowledgment. He turns around and stands up to see hundreds of women with blurred-out faces emerging from the forest and walking up the hill toward him. Fade to black.
Okay, okay, okay. I know that’s a lot to unpack, and you’re probably thinking that this is a bunch of artsy bullshit. Initially, I did too. But if we break it down, there is much more here than meets the eye. Starting with the Three Beggars, these represent the trifecta of depression. Pain, despair, and suffering. Personified by a fox, a crow, and a deer respectively. The name beggars is chosen as a symbol for those begging for reprieve from sadness and misery. Looking back at the prophecy, it is said that the meeting of the Three Beggars will result in a death. This is a metaphor for suicide. When someone is completely overburdened by these elements of depression, it becomes unbearable. At this point, it seems that the only way out is well… out. The three beggars arrive, and Gainsbourg dies at the hands of her husband. In terms of the film’s mythology, Gainsbourg believes that her fear of nature (Satan) has dissolved. In actuality, she becomes a vessel of nature’s evil. She thinks she’s the master but really she has become the servant. Now that Gainsbourg has served her purpose, Dafoe is possessed by evil and becomes the new vessel for Satan by killing his wife. It’s an analogy of the larger ripple effect that is caused by struggles with mental health, that bring us to dark places we never could have imagined.
When it comes to the much talked about act of self-mutilation that occurs at the film’s climax, I personally interpret that as Gainsburg's final and complete act/transformation into utter despair. In the moment where she seeks pleasure from her husband, all she can see is the image of her child falling to his death, and her complete ambivalence to it (Whether or not we are supposed to believe she is a reliable narrator during this flashback is up to interpretation. Personally, I don’t.). In her mind’s eye, the only way to atone for this moment of intense pleasure during a moment of such tragedy is to completely cut off that pleasure in the film’s graphic clitoridectomy. Sex becomes fully transformed into pain.
Now for the incredibly elusive epilogue. I think these women represent all the lives destroyed and taken by depression. In this scene, women are used specifically, as it refers to a subplot of the film regarding medieval violence against women. During this time women were considered evil witches because they suffered from what we now understand as mental illness. However, in the larger analogy of the film, the idea remains consistent with the prophecy of the Three Beggars. When we are faced with these unbearable emotions and suicide seems like the only option, it becomes an incredible force of evil that is increasingly difficult to pull away from. These hundreds of women are there to represent the millions of people, regardless of gender, who have lost that battle, now confronting the evil that took them away from the ones they loved.
In my search for meaning, I did something a little different this time around. I went back and watched the film again, this time with the director’s commentary that comes packaged with the Criterion release of the film. I’ve never watched a director’s commentary before, but with my obsession with the details and minutiae of the film, I really wanted to dive headfirst into Von Trer’s process. However, when watching I came to realize that most of the commentary consists of film scholar Murray Smith as he proposes different ideas about the film’s messaging and themes, only for Lars Von Trier to tell him that he’s wrong as they both start laughing. Not as informative as I had hoped, but it was pretty funny and very fitting for the style of Von Trier. I think it also does a good job poking a not-so-subtle finger at modern film studies, that like to overanalyze every single frame of a film (as if I’m not completely guilty of that either).
When it comes to looking for more direct answers, Von Trier himself isn’t even the greatest source of information. After the film’s 2009 premiere at Cannes, Von Trier stated "Truthfully, I can only say I was driven to make the film, that these images came to me and I did not question them. My only defense is: 'Forgive me, for I know not what I do… I am really the wrong person to ask what the film means or why it is as it is… It is a bit like asking the chicken about the chicken soup." The one element that he does give some clarity on is the Three Beggars. Through various interviews and the director’s commentary, he discusses how the Three Beggars were revealed to him in a dream during a shamanistic journey. He doesn’t entirely know what they are or what exactly they mean, but they stand as important symbols of the subconscious and the mental struggles he’s faced in his journey through life. While not a perfect answer, it does show that many of the film’s questions are not necessarily designed to be answered but rather felt by the audience. It’s an ending that is incredibly ambiguous and can be interpreted in a number of ways. While Antichrist gives no easy answers, it sure does give you a lot to think about.
I have seen very few films like Antichrist. Littered with metaphor, allegory, and layered storytelling, all in a very dream-like package, it’s a film that resembles the works of David Lynch more than it does that of Andrei Tarkovsky (to whom this film is dedicated, ironically enough). It’s just as much a horror movie as it is a thoughtful deconstruction of the mind. While I understand why this film is so polarizing, I can’t help but find it incredibly layered and cathartic, using it as a way to explore my own struggles with mental health. Miraculously, Von Trier has achieved the dream of many artists, by finding a way to tap into his sorrow and create something wholly unique, powerful, and thought-provoking. Using his art to repel the evils of the mind, Von Trier keeps the Three Beggars at bay, even if only for just a little bit longer.
Never stop fighting the good fight…