Artificial Eye banks on controversy for Antichrist success
In the face of strong competition from summer blockbusters, Antichrist [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Lars von Trier
film profile] distributor Artificial Eye has decided to drum up the film’s controversial elements in a bid to boost its 38-screen release tomorrow, July 24, calling Lars Von Trier’s film “one of the most controversial films released since A Clockwork Orange.”
The publicists’ press releases have verged on the sensational, with the latest release proclaiming:
“Early UK preview screenings have seen people run for the exit during the final scenes, physically retching. Antichrist has faced censorship in other areas. The film poster, featuring Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg in a graphic sex scene, has been met with uproar and Artificial Eye, the film company releasing Antichrist, has been barraged with complaints by offended cinemagoers.
“The poster image has been BANNED for use on the London underground and BANNED for use in the Metro newspaper. Social networking site, Facebook, has even BANNED the sex scene featured in the trailer. Antichrist flyers, also featuring the image, have even been sabotaged by outraged members of the public, ripped from display stands and destroyed, with cinema owners struggling to replenish stocks.”
The capitalisations of the word ‘banned’ are the publicists. Meanwhile, the film has to contend with a surfeit of content in the marketplace including holdovers featuring British icons such as Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (£20m gross), and Brüno, starring Sacha Baron Cohen (£10.3m).
Other new releases tomorrow include Guerilla Films’ Charles Dicken’s England, Revolver Entertainment’s Just Another Love Story [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and ICA Films’ Skin [+see also:
trailer
film profile], besides Walt Disney’s The Proposal.
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