Nymphomaniac: Vol. I
2013 · Directed by Lars von Trier
Original language: English
- drama
The story
A man named Seligman finds a fainted wounded woman in an alley and he brings her home. She tells him that her name is Joe and that she is nymphomaniac. Joe tells her life and sexual experiences with hundreds of men since she was a young teenager while Seligman tells about his hobbies, such as fly fishing, reading about Fibonacci numbers or listening to organ music.
What it’s like
Cold, desaturated daylight and grey urban interiors, shot in restless handheld digital with hard cuts and chapter-style intertitles, give this a clinical, confessional feel. Long conversations unspool in a plain flat room while the frame drifts to illustrated diagrams, fishing lines and birdsong, so the mood shifts between intimacy and detachment. Organ music and a sparse, unsettled score set the register: wry, melancholy, uneasy, sometimes darkly funny. Sexual content is frank and frequently explicit, with nudity and unsimulated-looking sex scenes, and there are brutal moments of assault and a graphic beating, though most of the film stays in talk and memory. It is adult and deliberately provocative, not gentle or soothing. It suits a late, alone viewing for people who want to watch a difficult, talky, self-aware character study about desire, shame and the stories we tell about ourselves, and who can sit with explicit material and a cold, unhurried pace.
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