When most filmmakers end up in a position where they need to make a commercial film they do something with comedy, or car chases, or kids trying to get laid.
The Danes take a different approach. If you’re Nicolas Winding Refn, you make two more Pusher movies. If you’re Lars Von Trier, you make a movie called Antichrist that features Willem Dafoe nailing Charlotte Gainsbourg against a tree’s massive root ball as numerous hands flap in the breeze.
Why don’t I live in Denmark?
This is the first official still from Antichrist, as published by Empire. (See the full, potentially NSFW image there.) Co-written by Anders Thomas Jensen, the film follows a therapist and his wife (Dafoe and Gainsbourg) as they retreat to a cabin in the woods to deal with the death of their child. Because it’s the sort of thing you’d expect to happen, the kid might be connected to the Antichrist.
I can’t wait to see Lars Von Trier punish Dafoe and Gainsbourg for two hours. If you’re at Cannes, you just might be among the first to witness Von Trier’s commercialism at work. Otherwise you’ll probably see it in the US this fall.