Lars von Trier's Antichrist Picked Up by IFC at Cannes

Yes, I am leaving this in two places on the site, and I want very much to share it, especially with Mr. von Trier himself...

Yesterday, something happened to me that's never happened to me before. I tripped out, became sickened and dizzy, the sky turned yellow and then black ... I'd just eaten and hadn't had much to smoke, but, I was introduced to the psyche of this filmmaker called Lars von Trier for the first time. I'd walked outside just at the right moment to hear a description of a typically gory genital mutilation scene from his latest production, Antichrist. Having in mind the thought of gory masterpieces like Sin City (I say one of the best films of any kind in these past ten years), or intensely (porno)graphic masterpieces like Jean Genet's novel Funeral Rites, my curiosity took hold and I naïvely asked, "So what's this movie about?"

I was expecting an answer typical of an artful shock film - that the plot would be shocking, fantastic, strange ... just what fits the adrenaline rush of being subjected to watching things happen to the human body that go far beyond any standard idea of horror and pain. The answer I got, though, entered my head and refused to leave it until I blacked out about a minute later. The plot is a real plot, with real and earthly human emotions, a real dysfunctional and painful relationship ... in short a real (but ultimately cheap - and I've now found the plots of all his films which I will enjoy trashing in a moment) tragedy.

Before saying more, I have to correct my above mistake of calling Lars' plot a "tragedy", which would give it an association with Tragedy with a capital T (Greek tragedies, Shakespeare & Jean Racine, Lorca, so on ...). Never before have I found a need to give a capital T to Tragedy, but now that I've learned that von Trier exists, it's stripped me of an innocence I previously had about Art, a kind of innocence Plato would have shared too (but we're both completely wrong) - I did not think it was possible that a gift as significant and profound as artistic ability, let alone extraordinary artistic ability, could reside in and give expression to a psyche as weak, backward, pathetic, disfigured and incapable as Lars von Trier's.

It's difficult to separate insult from praise when I talk about this man, and I know for sure that he'd take my disgust as a compliment and a stroke to his ego. That is mainly on account of the fact that he's not able to read into it to see what I'm actually saying about him - the furthest he could see into me is "another horrified viewer" who he successfully jabbed his ugliness into in the form of film. I, to him, am a great credit to his work and a good customer. He's been successful enough that his success keeps him well-protected, but what has he succeeded at, exactly? And is there anything beautiful, meaningful, or valuable about such a 'success'? Lars has never asked, and can't afford to because the right answer would result in him (doing as he should do in the real logical order of things and) committing suicide.

Here's what's powerful, the main thing that's powerful, about Tragedy (with the T) ... this is an artistic medium whose tradition reached a stage of maturity and refinement already in Ancient Greece, and in essence survives inescapably. A Tragedy is a uniting of human emotion and reason; in as few words as I can, it is a RATIONAL PLOT which leaves a painful mark. When you see a real Tragedy, you can't help but leave with the pain of the plot in your memory - you've become attached to the characters, you've seen them suffer and struggle and (most often) fall to complete destruction in the end. But this darkness in the pit of your stomach is the first step only; you're meant to think about the plot, because in a real Tragedy, the suffering of these beautiful characters is made organically; they are put together in a certain way where their interactions lead inexorably to the suffering they endure. There is no protagonist in a tragedy - everyone is a fully rounded, slightly imbalanced but genuine and believable human being. Even the most insidious, evil villains in Tragedies (say, Iago from Shakespeare's Othello) are real people. You can see how they got the way they are, you can feel what feelings motivate them to act; even if you don't relate, you see it. And you have to figure out, driven by the emotional reaction you've had, how this plot unfolded ... WHY these beautiful characters had to suffer so terribly, what led to what, how their interactions led to their downfall ... this is how a Tragedy enriches your life. And this is what I have always expected of Art, or to say it better ... this is what I have always expected of something done Artfully (whether it's Art of any kind, Science, Math, Cooking, anything..). I expect it to ENRICH LIFE. Sin City might give you nightmares, but it will take you to a twisted universe like no other you'll find in life. It's not a tragedy and not meant to be one, but an adrenaline-driven adventure through fantastic dark realms of the human mind. If you become emotionally invested in Sin City, you'll be physically reacting all throughout, trembling, cringing and jumping in horror ... but at the end you step off the roller coaster and go on through life, perhaps a bit richer because, hell, it's beautiful to have a two-hour adrenaline rush!

If experiencing Sin City is like experiencing a roller-coaster, or a ride in the space shuttle ... the experiencing a film of Lars von Trier is like experiencing a crowd of people in the final stages of grostesgue, disfiguring and infectious diseases surrounding you, grabbing your clothes, touching your face, begging you to give them a home to convalesce in. Let me cheapen three of his important plots that I've since found and read in detail as examples, then let me ask after that what is the value or merit of his artwork, ingeniously crafted as it may be (my film buff friend showed me some clips, I watched some more - in the physical, visual field of film, he is a genius).

Dancer in the Dark: This plot is essentially The Giving Tree, a famous children's book, where the Giving Tree wishes to give plenty to all the children in the neighborhood, but the greedy children strip it clean of its branches, and yet it still wishes to give more. In this case, Bjørk plays the Giving Tree, accompanied by her two equally naïvely beautiful Giving Tree friends, and the greedy children are money-hungry grown ups. And the Giving Tree doesn't just get stripped of all its branches, it gets hanged. Tah-dah. Is this a tragedy? I don't really think so, it's quite obvious that these are not real characters ... this is a good vs. evil story, hence an adventure story, but the result of this one makes you miserable while leaving nothing to think about. "Please, let me give you my infection ... let me touch your face with my leper hands." ... what else does this organism do?

Dogville: This is the best von Trier plot simply because the ending contains the only burst of positive energy ever found in his career - at the end, Lars copies the Bible's ending ... the long-suffering and inherently good Giving Tree character gets to watch the brutal vengeance she orders upon her oppressors carried out. I say this is his only film worth watching because, thanks to the positive jump at the end (spilled blood & guts kind of positive), you leave with the satisfaction of justice being served to the evil characters in this quasi-Christian tale of the good (Nicole Kidman playing "Grace") being tempted, lured in, and then made to suffer by the evil ... but nonetheless maintaining their goodness, just until God arrives at the end to brutally judge the sinners. This is also the greatest display of his cinematic skill; here challenging himself to do without sets (apart from chalk outlines), props, sound effects, screen shifts, any 'artificial' modifications at all. I have to be fair and say I highly recommend this one. Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

... and the piéce de resistance ...

Antichrist: Let me first say that this thing has already been put into the world, it's been introduced, there's nothing we can do but let curious people across the world get sick and hopefully heal themselves. However, I say it's simply stupid to watch this movie, it's like drinking water with cholera in it. Either you didn't know there was cholera in there, or you hate life and want to be rid of it, or you're just really thick-headed. Let me say, too, that such an extraordinary disease is almost justifiable in light of its skillful means of transmission ... this is an entirely new way of spreading disease. This is an Ebola sufferer donning the costumes of Shakespeare and giving a breathy monologue to an enthralled audience (thinking they are watching Shakespeare) at the Globe. It's a shape-shifting virus with a two-fold attack: FIRST - make it look as though you are setting up a Tragedy, for real. Invent a relationship grounded in reality (a couple stricken by the tragic death of their son), and begin to move the pieces as though you were heading toward a tragedy. The wife is losing her hold on reason, stricken by grief ... the husband, also a psychiatrist, starts to take steps to help her confront these 'demons' ... they retreat together to isolation ... SECOND - continue this tragedy as though it were Sin City, except an intimate setting of Sin City - Sin City in the bedroom, plus the ongoing realization that we are still in the middle of a story which is a story of REAL human emotion. A few squashed and chopped-off genitals, a few metal-grinding-against-human-bones scenes, and one strangled to death and cremated wife later ... we've been infected by the main line of the plot, which is one simple line: I am Lars, and there is a woman somewhere I hate. Probably my mother. And my spouse. I have no success with these women. Here's my revenge against womankind.

Here's what you find out amidst the ball-chopping, bone-drilling joy: The son's death was foreseen by the wife, but she irresponsibly didn't do anything about it because she was busy in the midst of sexual gratification with/from her husband. It's also psychotic mommy who's ball-chopping and bone-drilling and in fact doing all the damage to a by-then passed out daddy, and later sparing no flamboyance punishing herself. Daddy only does a bad thing at the end, ridding the world of this evil witch by strangulation and burning her at a pyre.

Now, go back up to the start of this plot, and then come to the finish again. What we have here is the setup of Tragedy, the setup that 'opens' emotion, that gets one in the mood and thinking of a Tragedy, involved with these characters as though they were you or I ... and the finale of a cheap gore film. Is there anything to think about? I don't see it really ... it's gore/porn, it could easily be entitled She: The Psycho Dominatrix from Hell and be sold as such. Only, this film is crafted to associate this kind of happening with elements of the actual, spiritual human psyche. Lars says to us: "For me, human emotion of the kind that pervades tragedy, and the reality of human relationships, is about the same as the Psycho Dominatrix from Hell."

Where Sin City breaks into your house and drags you through the streets like real man and makes you watch it in all its horror, Antichrist crawls up to you and asks you in an impassioned tone to listen, gets you to breathe deeply, and then coughs on you. I think to myself that what was in those droplets of infection was incubated inside Lars von Trier ... and I think to myself that he is nonetheless an Artist ... and my worldview has to be hugely modified to fit this fact. I've had to invent about ten new social classes to add onto the bottom of my social hierarchy in order to accurately place him in the very lowest one. And yet, his work has power, ingenuity, skill ... for the first time I have ever seen ... this creative energy is not enough to justify it. Art is a tool to communicate ... but that such a diseased man by some universal accident has been given the ability to vomit out his infections into films, or to be more fair to him ... vomit out his infections, then skillfully distill out of this vomit the most virulent, impure constituents, and then brilliantly construct something that appears at a far glance not to be made of vomit, feces, infected skin, pus, so on ...

Antichrist, I like to interpret as fully autobiographical work, von Trier judges women based on his own 'feminine side', which is completely unable to do anything at all other than to let events happen. Everything which is associated with 'feminine' in culture is in Lars completely retarded and almost caricaturishly weak and stupid. Indeed it recurs in his films that a charming but not very strong and imperious woman is completely trashed and destroyed by the stupid, miserable, greedy, cowardly males which I think constitute the masculine side of Lars. In that light, it seems as though Antichrist is the result of some attempt on his part to confront his 'feminine self', or the feminine elements in his mind, and the ensuing chaos that reigned ... BECAUSE Lars von Trier is completely incapable of fighting such a battle. Yet somewhere he finds the strength to create Art. This is a new kind of Artistic hero who is not really a hero at all. This is just a creature that SHOULD NOT EXIST.

Here is the Artist of our Generation, my friends. The weakest of all men, the most useless, the least likely to have the strength to survive anywhere, neither physically nor mentally/spiritually ... but most crafty liar as well, the man who can sneak into and out of anywhere, a man who is essentially all style and no content. But worse, Lars von Trier manages a trifecta: all style, no content, all leprosy. Antichrist especially constitutes the most pure and exact combination of every single virulent infection of human psyche, in particular male human psyche. This is the flagship of the cowardly man, the man who cannot fight off any disease, but can only sit and not move and let them enter and take their course, and then hope and ask for his master (for these men are instinctively slaves) to heal him.

Lars von Trier may have broken a new barrier - he has transcended his slavery and become a creative type. Yet a slave he remains ... he is something like Darth Vader ... very evil-looking, very powerful, very scary, but still when it comes down to it no more than a slave of the disfigured, limping, horrifyingly ugly Emperor. Now that I know of this creature, I am committed to waging Artistic war against this new breed of scum ... something in me tells me Lars may be an inspiration for a generation of slave-men to transcend themselves in the future, to finally release all the pressure inside by crafting out their diseases, introducing more and more infectious microorganisms into the stream of the world's Art. Who's going to invent penicillin if not other Artists who wish to defend this sacred human practice from infiltration by such a low breed of men? Who's going to keep the value of Art where it belongs when it's a vehicle for the transmission of the souls of such filthy slaves? Someone has to ... I for one will give my greatest effort, and I hope at least one other person may agree!