Are you a dedicated Sydneysider who doesn’t appreciate how doggone expensive this place has become? I know I sure am. Boredom and poverty are a couple whose commitment to each other is parallel to none. But take heart! Posing as an artistic wanker provides the opportunity to do many things for free. Gallery openings are good, sure, but blag an invitation to the free press screening of an upcoming film and you’ve got $16.00 worth of fun for a slim whisker!
With this in mind I was delighted to receive and invitation to a session of Antichrist at the State Theatre from two friends who are respectively ensconced in the film department of UNSW and UTS. To me Lars von Trier is like a junkie boyfriend, I don’t want to be drawn into his self-serving shenanigans but I love him and I can’t help it, and so I jumped at the chance. I’m suspicious that he may have conceived of the film Antichrist as a way to splatter the phrase ‘Lars von Trier: Antichrist’ all over movie posters and festival programmes.
However, there were no posters to be seen as we crawled into the bowels of the State Theatre. This subterranean locale turned out to be a very fitting locale for the diminutive Dane’s latest work.
Von Trier’s new feature film debuted at Cannes to a tepid response. If you have been living under a rock you may not have heard about the media circus that was generated by the graphic scenes of genital mutilation portrayed in this film by one (very brave) Charlotte Gainsbourg. I thought an on-camera clitorectomy would be the moment that turned me off von Trier for good and fronted up at the cinema fully prepared to dislike this film. However, Antichrist is actually very difficult to dislike. The values of the film are very complex, if a bit melodramatic. Von Trier critiques psychotherapy, religion, academia, motherhood, relationships and even the nature of reality. Just when you think you can finally pin him down on a narrow-minded generalisation the director changes track again and the viewer has to reassess the moral structure of the film several times over. Indeed, it is very difficult to discern who the real villain of the piece actually is, which keeps it interesting.
Other redeeming features included how visually stunning Antichrist is. Antichrist’s menacing atmosphere is a fitting tribute to Andrei Tarkovsky, the Russian director of films like Stalker and Solaris to whom Antichrist is dedicated. One character, a talking fox who feasts on his own gizzards, should go down in cinematic history as one of the most disturbing things ever put in a film.
However, it’s not all positive; for example it’s annoying when characters don’t display realistic reactions to their physical injuries. Willem Dafoe seems capable of a quiet chat with his wife whilst missing an ankle. Also, whilst Defoe and Gainsbourg are two examples of the finest acting talent this generation has to offer their stop/start, slightly bizarre conversations make the improvisation seem a little obvious and forced.
If you’re up to intense cinematic violence then I highly recommend giving Antichrist a look. If nothing else it will give you hours worth of conversational material for the pub. For us, a pub seemed like a meagre offering in comparison to the rosy pink noodle markets happening in Hyde Park next door. What better place to discuss genital mutilation than under a tree with wines and japancake? The worst part of the night was when it took me twenty minutes to realise jaPANCAKE was a play on words. Seriously.
Eliza Milliken