Product Details

• Actors: Willem Dafoe, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Storm Acheche Sahlstrřm
• Directors: Lars von Trier
• Format: Color, NTSC, Special Edition, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 2
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Criterion Collection
• DVD Release Date: November 9, 2010
• Run Time: 108 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (118 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B003KGBISE
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,622 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Antichrist (The Criterion Collection)" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Lars von Trier (Europa, Breaking the Waves, Dancer in the Dark) shook up the film world when he premiered Antichrist at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. In this graphic psychodrama, a grief-stricken man and woman—a searing Willem Dafoe (Platoon, The Last Temptation of Christ) and Cannes best actress Charlotte Gainsbourg (Jane Eyre, 21 Grams)—retreat to a cabin deep in the woods after the accidental death of their infant son, only to find terror and violence at the hands of nature and, ultimately, each other. But this most confrontational work yet from one of contemporary cinema’s most controversial artists is no mere provocation. It is a visually sublime, emotionally ravaging journey to the darkest corners of the possessed human mind; a disturbing battle of the sexes that pits rational psychology against age-old superstition; and a profoundly effective horror film.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

269 of 287 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The COMPLETE, UNCUT Criterion Edition! September 21, 2010

By A. Mazzola

Format:Blu-ray

So, a lot of people seem to be inquiring, myself included, about whether this version is the uncut or cut version of the film... so I decided to do a little digging...

I E-Mailed Criterion at [...] yesterday and got an E-Mail back today from a Karen Mesoznik who works there and this is what she had to say:

Hi Aaron,

Thanks for your email!

We are issuing the uncut version of this film (108 minutes). Our master is the same version as the one that premiered at Cannes; IFC did not edit the film for release here. It's possible there may be some confusion due to the French DVD which incorrectly states the run time as 120 minutes.

I hope this information is helpful. Thanks you for supporting Criterion and please let me know if you have any more questions!

Best,

Karen
The Criterion Collection

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So, I wondered what she meant by the French DVD stating 120, so I dug a little deeper and found out that the French DVD in fact states the film at 120 minutes, but the film itself is actually 108 minutes (uncut). There is no 120 minute version of the film. 108 minutes IS in fact the longest running time. The cut versions range from 100-104 minutes (depending on where and how you view the movie). If you have seen the 108 minute version, then you've seen it all, and THIS is what Criterion will be releasing. (The film in all of its unsettling glory!)

I hope this helped you guys! I will definately be purchasing this version myself. Hopefully this persuades people to do the same....

If anyone has any further doubts, feel free to E-Mail Criterion yourself at the E-Mail address mentioned earlier in my post! Read more ›

116 of 129 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A dark and disturbing but endlessly provocative and brilliantly shot depiction of woman, man, nature June 9, 2010

By Nathan Andersen TOP 500 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Blu-ray

A woman and a man lose their son in a tragic accident. Rather than trust in the medicine prescribed by her psychiatrist to ease her grief, he (a psychotherapist) decides to subject her to his own therapeutic regime. She (in an incredibly devastating performance by Charlotte Gainsbourg) will face her fears directly, and see that there is nothing to fear. He doesn't consider that he may have something to fear from her, or that he, with his clinical detachment from feeling and incessant preoccupation with the stance of observer, may be the one who truly needs therapy. (On that note it is hard not to detect a kinship of the themes of this film with the themes of von Trier and Jorgen Leth's The Five Obstructions, that set up von Trier himself as therapist to Leth, whose capacity for aesthetic detachment he found troubling).

The imagery in the film is fascinating and frightening - it is certainly von Trier's most accomplished film in terms of cinematography, and it definitely deserves to get the Criterion treatment. The prologue and epilogue are highly formalistic, shot in a series of powerful black and white images that border on the unreal; the rest of the film, broken into four chapters, is shot handheld with washed out but saturated colors, with rippling natural imagery and occasional freaks of nature that as a whole evokes a darker vision of Tarkovsky's zone (from Stalker).... The film is in fact dedicated to Tarkovsky, and suggests a kind of inversion of his values and approach: whereas Tarkovsky finds in nature the potential for transcendence, suggested but not depicted, von Trier depicts in nature the reality of hell, a "Satan's church" where, as the fox asserts, "chaos reigns"; where Tarkovsky takes long, leisurely tracking shots, von Trier's are a bit jerky and employ the occasional jump cut, but he also employs the trademark Tarkovskian slow zoom into extreme close up on a partial face or gesture, and also (as I recall) occasionally employs the "temporal folding" that is common in Tarkovsky's films, where in the course of a single pan or tracking shot of the camera, events are depicted as if simultaneous that could not have been.

The film has been described by several critics as suggesting that women are evil, and the setting in a woods they call "Eden" makes it hard not to see "she" (Gainsbourg) as a kind of twisted Eve figure whose longings and obsessions (and sense of guilt) introduce evil and death into the garden. Still, it seems to me that the central character in the film is "He" and the film uses him as an object lesson to provide a critical depiction of a paranoid male fantasy/nightmare. "He" (played admirably by Willem Dafoe) is a therapist who is confident of his powers, and was obsessed by his job and detached from his wife and son until the accident allowed him to treat her as patient. He had dismissed as trite her writing and research on misogyny and "gynocide" - hatred and violence against women, born of fear -- and was emotionally distant from her until now she became for him a fascinating object of study. He becomes threatened and uneasy when she seems to have been cured, and seeks to continue the therapy by whatever means necessary. What she really fears, he insists, is that the male fears about women that inspired the violence she had studied were in fact true, that women are in fact evil - and that she is herself the object of her fears. When his projection onto her becomes real, when the fear he projected onto her comes to life, it becomes clear that this is his own paranoid fantasy, his own fear of aggressive female sexuality come to life allows him to justify and actualize the violent retaliation he had formerly only been able to realize against her in words, by objectifying and dismissing her.

It is as if, von Trier's film suggests, as if the modern version of the old male fear of the feminine, expressed then by accusing powerful women of witchcraft as a justification for doing them violence, as if this fear has been transformed or sublimated into the male pretense of objectivity. An objectivity that treats women as if their fears and concerns were utterly banal, but only out of a deeper anxiety that if women were to realize that male objectivity is really a new form of witchcraft aimed at silencing women, if women were to realize this they would come into their own and that would be the real danger. The film does not, as I see it, in any way endorse this view of women, or this fear, but depicts it powerfully in the form of a perverse parody. Not for the timid, but not to be dismissed, either, as if it were merely another provocative and shocking joke by that Danish trickster, Lars von Trier. It's a subtle and complex film, powerfully shot, darkly scintillating and dangerous.

Here's what to expect on the Criterion release:

New, restored high-definition digital transfer, approved by director Lars von Trier and supervised by director of photography Anthony Dod Mantle (with DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
Audio commentary by von Trier and professor Murray Smith
Video interviews with von Trier and actors Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg
A collection of video pieces delving into the production of Antichrist, including interviews with von Trier and key members of his filmmaking team as well as behind-the-scenes footage
Chaos Reigns at the Cannes Film Festival 2009, a documentary on the film's world premiere, plus press interviews with Dafoe and Gainsbourg
Three theatrical trailers
PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar Ian Christie Read more ›

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Honestly, One of the Ten Best Films of 2009 September 3, 2010

By Joshua Miller VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

Lars von Trier's latest film caused quite a stir when it made it's debut at the Cannes Film Festival this year. Audiences there were divided, with some calling it beautiful and brilliant, while many others called it repulsive and pornographic. Antichrist is essentially an art film with many horror film elements. It has very graphic scenes of sexual imagery, as well as sexual mutilation...This is what has scared many filmgoers who have not given the film the attention it deserves.

The film's Prologue shows a couple (Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg) engaged in passionate (and, in one shot, explicit) lovemaking as their young son falls from a window to his death. This scene, shot in black and white, is one of the most beautifully filmed scenes I have ever seen in a film. The following is presented in four chapters; Grief, Pain (Chaos Reigns), Despair (Gynocide), and The Three Beggars, followed by an Epilogue. It follows He and She coping, He better than her. She is mad with grief, while He has found a way to muffle his emotions. The two go to their cabin in the woods (called "Eden"), so He (a therapist) can help her further.

It's when chapter three begins that the scenes that had Cannes talking begin. This chapter specifically contains the most well-known image from the film of Dafoe and Gainsbourg under a tree, an image I find deeply unsettling in a film filled with unsettling images. Many viewers have mentioned the talking fox as being laughable, but I found it quite creepy and well-done. Von Trier uses CGI in this film, but it's a beautifully rendered use of the technology and it's not used often.

This is a movie filled with symbolism; some obvious, some a little more inconspicuous.... I don't want to attempt to dissect any meaning from the film as I've read so much into it, I believe I'd have a biased view. With that said, I'm not sure anyone has nailed down von Trier's exact intent and I'm sure that whatever you take away from the film is close enough.

Now, on the performances...Dafoe and Gainsbourg show they are absolutely fearless in these performances, which show them willing to go places few actors would. Gainsbourg won the Best Actress award at Cannes and it's no wonder as she puts both her body and soul on the line in this performance. Dafoe is very convincing but isn't required to hit on all the emotions required by Gainsbourg. There are those who have blasted Dafoe's character as emotionless, but I don't see it this way. Dafoe grieves for his son, just as Gainsbourg does, but his grieving is characterized more by rationality and reservation than absolute emotional Hell.

Now, as for Antichrist being labeled "pornography," I must say that this is very inaccurate. Not a single scene in this film is intended to arouse and von Trier seems to use the graphic sexual imagery as a way of exposing these character's inside and out. Furthermore, as She sees sex as being the cause of their son's death, these scenes of human nature and the human anatomy seem necessary for what the film is trying to illustrate. Does the film use explicit sexual imagery only when completely necessary? No, probably not. But I'm sure, in his own strange way, von Trier could justify this. On a similar note, many of it's violent images may be intended solely for shock value, but von Trier's use of this imagery doesn't come across as exploitive the way it would in a film by Eli Roth for example.

The cinematography in this film, by Academy Award-winning cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle, is beyond masterful. Minus the shot of explicit sex, if the first scene of this film was released as a short film I have no doubt it would have received a lot more acclaim than this film has. The cinematography here makes one appreciate just how important good cinematography is to good filmmaking, for without a cinematographer of Mantle's merit I doubt von Trier would have been able to make this film. Many reviews (from both critics and audiences) have frequently cited this film as "boring," and I expected that after hearing it labeled an "art film." I was surprised watching Antichrist, because there wasn't a single moment where I found myself bored with it. Both the beauty and the horror of the images onscreen kept me so transfixed that I found myself less interested in how the plot would progress, but how the images onscreen would progress.

It's not hard to see why many will completely reject and recoil from this film, but that's to be expected from a von Trier movie. Many who have loved his movies previously will hate this movie. I hated two out of the three films I've seen by the man previously and I loved this movie. Antichrist is a poetic, slow-moving film with shocking, memorable images and two fearless performances. It's a powerful film that is uncompromising in it's vision and not afraid to take it's audience to the depths of despair in a way that few films could or would. I am happy to be in the minority here when I say that Antichrist is one of the best films of 2009.

GRADE: A Read more ›