Antichrist, Lars von Trier

Certainly the most difficult movie to sit through that I've seen this year, Antichrist features excellent performances by Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg as an unnamed married couple. The movie opens with the accidental death of their toddler son and thrusts them into the long period of grief and guilt that follow.
Much of the movie's difficulty is emotional, stemming from the movie's tight focus on the couple. Except for the brief appearances of that child, the film depicts no other characters but Dafoe's and Gainsbourg's. Other difficult elements are more physical and require us to anticipate and watch excrutiating acts of torture.
Von Trier explores the inherent evil in Nature, human and otherwise, asking us to consider if human evil is natural or a perversion. Though I was emotionally (and physically) drained after watching the film, I was fascinated by von Trier's efforts to combine a tale of anti-misogyny with those very misogynistic elements it would have us deplore.
We saw the film a 2nd time on 19 November; it holds up well.


Highly recommended--but with caveats.