The Films of Lars von Trier and Philosophy by José A. Haro & William H. Koch

Author:José A. Haro & William H. Koch
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030249182
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

Crossing over, Entering into the Serpent

I see the heat of anger or rebellion or hope split open that rock, releasing la Coatlicue . And someone in me takes matters into our own hands, and eventually, takes dominion over serpents—over my own body, my sexual activity, my soul, my mind, my weaknesses and strengths. Mine. Ours. Not the heterosexual white man’s or the colored man’s or the state’s or the culture’s or the religion’s or the parents’—just ours, mine. (Anzaldúa 1999, 73)

Western thought sees sex and gender as two separate, divided elements, often promoting male gender as superior to the female gender. Such a view is faulty for this universe. In Mesoamerican thought, duality, equilibrium, and fluidity are integral to the universe and to understanding corporeality. This concept of duality is not fixed or static but constantly changing. Everything, from the divine to the people, to things, to time and space, has fluid duality, constantly shifting between feminine and masculine. This movement permeates all areas of nature and transforms all identity. Dual gender is fundamental in Mesoamerican thought, a pulsating dynamism (Marcos 2000).

In Antichrist, the constant friction between She and He’s identities evidences the binary views of Western thought: sex and gender are divided, the body is the boundary to the external world, mind and body are separated, and the male gender is exterior—and superior—to the female. In The Second Sex, Simon de Beauvoir (2012) explains that women are often otherized within a male conceptualization of our world, which propels women to see the world through men. Gloria Anzaldúa (1999) sees this too when she concludes that women’s being, wild tongues, and spirits are erased within male discourses. Lars von Trier confronts us with this reality through She and He’s injured unity. She wants to see the world through He. She accepts, albeit reluctantly, that He can rescue her; She accepts, albeit reluctantly, her position as woman-victim, woman-in-need, in front of He. She rationalizes her guilt recognizing that her desire for sex and orgasm was stronger than her taking care of her son. She sees herself through He’s eyes and realizes She must be guilty of her son’s death. She suffers for this sin and He is the only one capable of saving her. For if He forgives her, She can forgive herself. He is her savior. He is her god.

For a woman in love, according to de Beauvoir, human love and divine love melt into one because it is a movement toward transcendence, toward the absolute. This woman in love must save her fortuitous existence by “uniting with the Whole incarnated in a sovereign Person” (2012, 684). Antichrist’s She seeks this union. It’s not accidental that Lars von Trier depicts She as an arduous student developing a thesis on witchcraft and misogyny, just as it is not coincidence that the actor who plays He, Willem Dafoe, had been Jesus Christ in Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ. I believe it was important for Lars von Trier to make these connections to enter the realm of the mystic in Antichrist.

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