Antichrist

Release Date (UK) - 24 July 2009

Certificate (UK) - 18

Country - Denmark

Director - Lars von Trier

Runtime - 108 mins

Starring - Willem Defoe, Charlotte Gainsborough

Antichrist is by far the most controversial film of the year. The critics at Cannes booed and walked out, and opinion is totally divided on whether Lars von Trier's film is a masterpiece or a gore fest in which he has gone too far. For me its a masterpiece, but a very flawed one. Its well known that von Trier had depression when he made the film and the dark story reflects this depression. However the film contains the most beautiful imagery I've seen in a long while and if it wasn't for the dark and slightly boring plot this would have been unrecognisably the most amazing film in years.

Defoe and Gainsborough, playing unnamed characters are a couple who are stricken by tragedy in the opening prologue when there young son accidentally dies falling out of a window. In the following chapters Defoe, a therapist, tries to counsel Gainsborough out of her grief and they go to 'Eden' their retreat cabin in the woods to try and overcome her grief and fears. There's not that much dialogue and the plot gets odder and odder when they arrive at Eden but the imagery outways the odd story and gore scenes. I wouldn't even term it gore, I don't know whether von Trier was trying to take the film to a new level of shocking cinema or whether his depression was so far deep that this was all he could conceive. There are graphic scenes of sex, violence and even genital mutilation that will disturb many people. I was perhaps the only person that didn't have to look away in the cinema, but after watching Salo at a young age no film has ever caused me to do so yet.

The film is dedicated to Andrei Tarkovski and its not hard to see why with the beautiful imagery and cinematography. The focus on nature is a key motif in Tarkovski's work and the beautifully held wide shots of the forest vividly evoke Tarkovski films particularly Ivan's Childhood. For any fans of Tarkovski this is a must but its to be avoided by even the slightly faint hearted.