ABSTRACT
Von Trier has no inhibition about announcing he is the best film director in the world—something that might suggest a touch of the omnipotent antichrist who in the next breath compares himself to God and questions God’s ability to do his job. Von Trier wrote the script for Antichrist in the midst of a crippling depression for which he was receiving cognitive therapy. He confesses he felt “no pleasure in doing this film” and ventures no ideas as to what the film signifies. Von Trier’s picture of his childhood is bleak and lonely. His parents were civil servants who rebelled against authority and rules. Von Trier has created a modern-day morality play, situated in the Garden of Eden. The final scene depicts the husband, leaving Eden, hobbling on a crutch through a desiccated landscape where Nature has been destroyed. It is the final triumph of Rationality, and the hills are suddenly swarming with pilgrims advancing towards their new God.
