Taglines: Chaos reigns.
In the psychological thriller that evolves into a horror film, Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg will play a couple who retreat to an isolated cabin in the woods following the death of their child. The film stars only two actors, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe. Primarily a Danish production, the film was also co-produced with companies from five other countries.
Antichrist movie storyline. Since premiering at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, where Gainsbourg won the festival’s award for Best Actress, the film has come under attack for what some critics view as misogyny, as well as for featuring explicit sexual violence. At the same time many critics have also praised the film for its visuals and serious approach.
Antichrist was originally scheduled for production in 2005, but its executive producer Peter Aalbæk Jensen accidentally revealed the planned ending. Lars von Trier was furious and decided to delay the shoot so he could rewrite the script.
The title was the first thing that was written for the film. The post-depression version of the script was to some extent written as an exercise for Trier, to see if he had recovered enough to be able to work again. Trier has also made references to August Strindberg and his Inferno Crisis in the 1890s, comparing it to his own writing under difficult mental circumstances: “was Antichrist my Inferno Crisis?”
Antichrist is a Danish experimental art film written and directed by Lars von Trier, starring Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg. It tells the story of a couple who, after the death of their child, retreat to a cabin in the woods where the man experiences strange visions and the woman manifests increasingly violent sexual behaviour and sadism. The narrative is divided into a prologue, four chapters and an epilogue. The film was primarily a Danish production but co-produced by companies from six different European countries. It was filmed in Germany and Sweden.
Filming took 40 days to finish, from 20 August to the end of September 2008. The film was shot in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Locations were used in Rhein-Sieg-Kreis, part of the Cologne region, and Wuppertal. It was the first film by Trier to be entirely filmed in Germany. The fictional setting of the film however is near Seattle, USA.
The film was shot on digital video, primarily using Red One cameras in 4K resolution. The slow motion sequences were shot with a Phantom V4 in 1,000 frames per second. Filming techniques involved dollys, hand-held camerawork and computer-programmed “motion control”, of which the team had previous experience from Trier’s 2006 film The Boss of It All. One shot, where the couple is copulating under a tree, was particularly difficult since the camera would switch from being hand-held to motion controlled in the middle of the take.
Trier had not recovered completely from his depression when filming started. He repeatedly excused himself to the actors for being in the mental condition he was, and was not able to operate the camera as he usually does, which made him very frustrated. “The script was filmed and finished without much enthusiasm, made as it was using about half of my physical and intellectual capacity,” the director said in an interview.
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Antichrist (2009)
Directed by: Lars von Trier
Starring by: Willem Dafoe, Charlotte Gainsbourg
Screenplay by: Anders Thomas Jensen
Production Design by: Karl Júlíusson
Cinematography by: Anthony Dod Mantle
Film Editing by: Åsa Mossberg, Anders Refn
Costume Design by: Frauke Firl
Art Direction by: Tim Pannen
Distributed by: IFC Films
Release Date: October 16, 2009
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