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4%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.
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9[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/12456-antichrist-dir-lars-von-trier_4162.jpg]]
10[[caption-width-right:350:[[AxCrazy "You're leaving me!"]]]]
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12->''"Chaos... reigns."''
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14''Antichrist'' is a 2009 {{psychological horror}} art film written and directed by Creator/LarsVonTrier.
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16Imagine what a film co-directed by the Creator/StanleyKubrick who made ''Film/TheShining'', the Creator/DavidLynch who made ''Film/{{Eraserhead}}'' and the Creator/AndreiTarkovsky who made ''Film/Stalker1979'' could look like, and you're getting close to the idea of what ''Antichrist'' is.
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18The film centers around [[NamelessNarrative "He" and "She"]] (Creator/WillemDafoe and Creator/CharlotteGainsbourg, respectively) attempting to deal with the grief surrounding the death of their infant son, Nic. He, a psychologist, proposes exposure therapy at their cabin in the woods appropriately called [[RuleOfSymbolism "Eden"]], due to skepticism surrounding traditional medication-based treatment. Things go FromBadToWorse. Much, much worse...
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20The movie started a heated controversy during its premiere at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, with most critics praising the film for its technological accomplishments, while bitterly divided over its merits or lack thereof. Many detractors accused the movie of being deeply misogynistic as well as artless {{euroshlock}}. Not helping was Von Trier (facetiously, we hope) declaring himself the "best director in the world" and Gainsbourg winning Best Actress.
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22The film was the first of Von Trier's "Depression Trilogy", followed by ''Film/{{Melancholia}}'' and ''Film/{{Nymphomaniac}}''.
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24For the similarly-named trope, see TheAntichrist.
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26!!This film provides examples of:
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28* AgonyOfTheFeet: [[spoiler:While alone with Nic, She used to switch his shoes, which caused small deformations in his feet.]]
29* AnimalisticAbomination: [[spoiler:The Three Beggars, Grief, Pain and Despair, are represented as a doe, a fox, and a crow respectively. [[MindScrew Maybe]]]].
30* AxCrazy: Between her increasingly frantic and illegible writings, [[spoiler:her firm belief that women are inherently evil]], and the excessively manic and violent behavior towards He, She fits this trope to a T.
31* BigBadTriumvirate: [[spoiler:The Three Beggars, Grief, Pain and Despair, three supernatural beings who haunt Eden and caused the plot by driving She insane.]]
32* TheBlank: Pretty much everyone who isn't He, She, or Nic has their face blurred out. This also goes for [[spoiler:the horde of women He sees in the end]].
33* BodyHorror: While hiking to Eden, He finds a doe[[spoiler:… with a stillborn fawn hanging off her.]] Later on, He runs into a fox [[spoiler: in the process of self-disemboweling itself, and before that, He wakes up with his hand covered in ticks full of blood.]]
34* BookEnds: Both the prologue and epilogue are DeliberatelyMonochrome with no sound except for Händel's "Liascia ch'io pianga".
35* ChekhovsGun: [[spoiler: The wrench under the porch.]] [[spoiler:The hole in the ground by the tree.]]
36%%* CrapsackWorld: [[WebVideo/BrowsHeldHigh Even the acorns are miserable.]] And possibly vicious.
37* DarkerAndEdgier: As ''Film/TrashHumpers'' (which came out in the same year, coincidentally enough) was for Creator/HarmonyKorine is ''Antichrist'' for Lars Von Trier; a new dark-and-edgy low in an oeuvre already known for its morbidity. It set the tone for ''Film/{{Melancholia}}'' and ''Film/{{Nymphomaniac}}'' after it.
38* DeathOfAChild: The death of the pair's young son is what begins the film.
39* DeliberatelyMonochrome: The opening and closing sequences.
40* DroneOfDread: The entire soundtrack -- minus Händel's "Lascia ch'io pianga" in the prologue and conclusion.
41* EmpathyDollShot: In the opening scene, Nic has a teddy bear which is shown in close up crashing onto the street.
42%%* EverythingTryingToKillYou: Even the acorns.
43* TheFaceless: Apart from the two main protagonists and their son, the few supporting cast members appearing have their faces deliberately blurred.
44* FanDisservice: The only nudity in the film that actually appears sexy is in the first few minutes. The rest of it, such as She crying as she begs He to slap her during sex, then masturbating furiously in the woods when he refuses, isn't.
45* FemaleMisogynist: She believes that women are evil and were tortured and killed in history because they were evil.
46* FoulFox: The protagonist comes across a fox eating its own insides. The fox snarls at him, then speaks with a deep human voice: "Chaos reigns."
47%%* LeFilmArtistique: According to the film's detractors.
48* GainaxEnding: [[spoiler:After killing She and burning her corpse, He manages to walk away, and then sees a multitude of faceless women, likely spirits, who walk towards and past him while he looks on in awe.]]
49* GenreShift: Starts as a PsychologicalThriller, then progressively shifts to PsychologicalHorror.
50* {{Gorn}}: A bit over-emphasized by the critics, there are actually only ''two short'' gore scenes, toward the end of the movie. That said, these two scenes are really, ''really'', '''''really''''' horrible.
51* GroinAttack: In both the male and female equivalent, both [[GrossUpCloseUp captured with excruciating detail]], [[spoiler:and respectively inflicted and self-inflicted.]]
52%%* HumansAreBastards: Then again, so is nature, apparently.
53* IntimatePsychotherapy: {{Subverted|trope}}, she tries using sex to dull her depression, but this does more harm than good.
54* IfICantHaveYou: She panics when she thinks He is leaving her. [[spoiler: It gets very messy.]]
55* JumpScare: At one point, He approaches a fox hidden in a field, and as he reaches out to touch it, it jumps up at him with a dissonant ScareChord.
56* LeaveTheCameraRunning: The movie is dedicated to Andrei Tarkovsky for a reason.
57* MinimalistCast: Aside from some people at the funeral [[spoiler:and the horde of women at the end]], the only characters for the majority of the film are He and She.
58* NatureIsNotNice: Von Trier was inspired by a nature documentary which compared the animal kingdom to hell, among other influences.
59* NeverTrustATitle: TheAntiChrist never shows up in the film, nor does anything explicitly Satanic aside from certain references by She. The title comes from the original ending, where it's revealed that Satan made this world as opposed to God.
60* NoNameGiven: The main protagonists are never named, not even in the end credits, where they are just designated as "He" and "She". The only character named is their son Nic.
61* OneWordTitle: ''Antichrist''.
62%%* ParentalNeglect: She accuses He of this. She is crazy. But She's possibly right.
63* PrimalScene: {{Inverted}}. It's shown that Nic didn't see his parents having sex, but She saw him [[spoiler:jumping from the window]], but this may be [[spoiler:an intrusive false thought on her part, as a result of guilt]]. The film is highly ambiguous about this.
64%%* ReligiousHorror: {{Deconstructed}}.
65* RoomFullOfCrazy: {{Double subverted}} regarding the attic where She did her thesis studies. The crazy was originally regular research material for a dissertation about misogyny, but then [[HeWhoFightsMonsters She really began to believe that women are inherently evil.]]
66* SanitySlippage: She was already going cuckoo due to the guilt brought on by Nic's death. [[spoiler:Then He discovers that She was putting Nic's shoes on the wrong feet, causing minor deformations, which is when She ''really'' goes off the deep end]].
67* ShowerOfLove: She and He are obliviously having quite explicit sex in the shower during the film's opening scene, even as their unsupervised young son accidentally falls to his death.
68* SlowMotionFall: Nic falls to his death in slow motion in the opening scene.
69* SnowMeansDeath: Nic is mesmerized by snowflakes before he falls out of the window.
70* SoundtrackDissonance: The prologue combines the beautiful aria "Lascia ch'io pianga" with the images of He and She ''graphically'' having sex as well as [[spoiler:Nic falling to his death]].
71* TalkingAnimal: [[spoiler:The self-disemboweling fox He encounters is able to speak two words: "Chaos reigns."]]
72* ThematicSeries: Part of the "Depression" Trilogy along with ''Film/{{Nymphomaniac}}'' and ''Film/{{Melancholia}}''.
73* ThereAreNoTherapists: Averted in that He is a therapist. Things get out of hand anyway.
74%%* ThingsThatGoBumpInTheNight: {{Lampshade|hanging}}d and heavily {{played with}}.
75* {{Yandere}}: She. [[spoiler:Especially near the end.]]

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