Nymphomaniac (stylised as NYMPH()MANIAC onscreen and in advertising, and sometimes as NYMPH(;)MANIAC) is a 2013 erotic drama art film written and directed by Lars von Trier. The film stars Charlotte Gainsbourg, Stellan Skarsgård, Stacy Martin, Shia LaBeouf, Christian Slater, Jamie Bell, Uma Thurman, Jean-Marc Barr, Willem Dafoe, Connie Nielsen, and Mia Goth; both Martin and Goth appeared in their film debut. Separated into two films, the plot follows Joe (played by Gainsbourg and Martin), a self-diagnosed "nymphomaniac" who recounts her erotic experiences to a bachelor who helps her recover from an assault. The narrative chronicles Joe's promiscuous life from adolescence to adulthood and is split into eight chapters told across two volumes. The film was originally supposed to be only one complete entry, but, because of its length, von Trier made the decision to split the project into two separate films. Nymphomaniac was an international co-production of Denmark, Belgium, France, and Germany.
The world premiere of the uncut Volume I occurred on 16 February 2014 at the 64th Berlin International Film Festival, while the uncut Volume II premiered at the 71st Venice International Film Festival. The world premiere of the Director's Cut took place in Copenhagen on 10 September 2014. It was nominated for the 2014 Nordic Council Film Prize.
Nymphomaniac is the third and final installment in von Trier's unofficially titled Depression Trilogy, following Antichrist and Melancholia.
Plot
Highly educated but cloistered middle-aged bachelor Seligman finds nymphomaniac Joe beaten up and lying in the alleyway behind his apartment. He takes her to his home and listens as Joe recounts the story of her libidinous life. Seligman parallels much of what she has experienced with various methods of fly fishing, his favorite sport.
Volume I Joe is raised by a loving father and detached mother. In adolescence, she loses her virginity to neighbor Jerôme, who then leaves her to fix his moped. Seligman notes that Jerôme penetrated her three times vaginally and five anally, resembling the Fibonacci sequence.
Years later, Joe and her friend B engage in a contest to see who can have sex with the most passengers on a train before its arrival, the winner receiving a bag of chocolate. Joe wins after fellating S, a married passenger who resists both girls' advances until Joe forces herself on him and orally rapes him.
Joe relays her first experiences with actual love, which she calls "lust with jealousy added". She and her friends establish a club, "The Little Flock", dedicated to freely having sex in an effort to reject society's fixation on love. Joe leaves after all the other members develop serious attachments to their conquests. As a young adult, Joe drops out of medical school and finds work as a secretary at a printing company. Her first employer is Jerôme. She avoids his advances in favor of sleeping with other co-workers, to his consternation. Joe writes Jerôme a letter after realizing her feelings for him, but realizes he has left with the jealous secretary, Liz. She is immediately fired by Jerôme's uncle, the owner of the company, and goes back to indulging her nymphomania despite yearning for Jerôme.
While Joe is with one of her lovers, H, his wife arrives and admonishes them in front of their children, which the present-day Joe admits barely affected her. Another lover, A, arrives in the middle of Mrs. H's breakdown. The family eventually leaves, after Mrs. H verbally attacks Joe, slaps H, and flees the apartment, wailing.
A conversation about Edgar Allan Poe's death reminds Joe of the last time she saw her father; she is the only one to visit him in the hospital as he dies of cancer. Joe watches her father experience violent spasms and paranoid delusions, screaming for his wife. To distract herself, Joe has intercourse with several people at the hospital. When he finally dies, Joe becomes aroused before becoming overwhelmed with depression.
After Seligman asserts that Bach perfected polyphony, Joe discusses the lovers leading up to her "cantus firmus" - F, a tender but predictable man who prioritizes Joe's sexual needs over his own, and G, whose animalistic control of Joe thrills her. While walking in a local park, Joe encounters Jerôme, who has left Liz. They embrace and engage in authentically passionate sex, but Joe is distraught when she can no longer "feel anything".
Volume II Joe becomes annoyed with Seligman's focus on allegories, realizing he cannot relate to her experiences. He confirms his asexuality and virginity, but claims this makes him best equipped to listen to her story.
Joe reminisces about a vision she had as a young girl of Valeria Messalina and the Whore of Babylon looking over her as she levitates and spontaneously has her first orgasm, which Seligman calls a mockery of the Transfiguration of Jesus.
Joe suffers a crisis over her inability to achieve sexual pleasure, eventually having a baby, named Marcel, with Jerôme. Their relationship becomes further strained when Jerôme allows her to see other men.
Joe begins visiting K, a professional dominant who performs excessively sadistic BDSM acts on women seeking his company. At Christmas, after rescuing an unattended Marcel who has wandered onto a snowy balcony, Jerôme makes her choose between the family and herself. She chooses the latter, later receiving an especially brutal beating from K that makes her climax again. Marcel is sent to a foster home. Years later, Joe has regained pleasure, but her genitalia are irreversibly damaged. Her new boss, knowing of her habits, demands she attend sex addiction therapy.
Joe becomes pregnant and seeks an abortion, but the doctor insists she speak to a counselor first. When this ends disastrously, Joe performs the procedure herself with several household implements and a wire hanger. In the present, Joe and Seligman argue about abortion rights.
Joe reluctantly attends therapy and attempts sobriety. During one meeting, she sees her younger self in the mirror, insults the other group members, and proclaims pride in her nymphomania before leaving. Feeling ostracized from "normal" society, Joe becomes a debt collector. She reminisces about a house call to a man she initially finds sexually unreadable. She ties him to a chair, strips him, and provokes him, ultimately gleaning that he is a repressed paedophile and fellating him. She explains to Seligman that she empathized with his status as a sexual outcast, and lauds him for never acting on his desires.
Joe's superior, L, suggests she groom P, the 15-year-old daughter of criminals. Joe is initially repulsed by the idea, but begins a sexual relationship with P after she turns 18, later inviting P to move in with her while hesitantly teaching P her job.
During one round of debt collection, Joe realizes they are at a house belonging to Jerôme and tells P to perform the job herself. After learning P is having an affair with Jerôme, Joe ambushes them in an alleyway and attempts to shoot them. Jerôme viciously beats Joe before having sex with P in front of her. P urinates on Joe before leaving.
In the present, Seligman suggests Joe's experiences were fueled by differences in gender representation; her guilt and shame made her fight "like a man", ultimately "forgetting" to rack the gun because her human worth forbade her to kill someone. Joe finally feels content, having unburdened her story to someone she truly considers a friend.
As she sleeps, Seligman attempts to rape Joe, but Joe wakes up and reaches for the gun. Seligman attempts to justify himself, but Joe shoots him and flees the apartment.
Cast
Main cast Charlotte Gainsbourg as Joe (ages 35–50) Stacy Martin as Young Joe (ages 15–31) Stellan Skarsgård as Seligman Shia LaBeouf as Jerôme Morris Christian Slater as Joe's Father Jamie Bell as K Uma Thurman as Mrs. H Willem Dafoe as L Mia Goth as P Sophie Kennedy Clark as B Connie Nielsen as Katherine (Joe's mother) Michaël Pas as Older Jerôme Jean-Marc Barr as The Debtor Gentleman Udo Kier as The Waiter
Vol. I cast Maja Arsovic as Joe (7 years) Sofie Kasten as B (10 years) Ananya Berg as Joe (10 years) James Northcote as Young Lad #1 on Train Charlie G. Hawkins as Young Lad #2 on Train Jens Albinus as S Felicity Gilbert as Liz, The Secretary Jesper Christensen as Jerôme's Uncle Hugo Speer as Mr. H Cyron Melville as Andy (A) Saskia Reeves as Nurse Nicolas Bro as F Christian Gade Bjerrum as G Anders Hove as Odin (extended version only)
Vol. II cast Shanti Roney as Tobias, The Interpreter Laura Christensen as Babysitter Caroline Goodall as Psychologist Kate Ashfield as Therapist Tania Carlin as Renée Daniela Lebang as Brunelda Omar Shargawi as Thug #1 Marcus Jakovljevic as Thug #2 Severin Von Hoensbroech as Debtor In Greenhouse
Production Pre-production Executive producer and Zentropa co-founder Peter Aalbæk Jensen revealed that the film is to be two parts. "We are making two films. It is a big operation. I personally hope that we should be ready for Cannes next year. We will shoot both and edit both – and we want to finish both at the same time." He explained there will be two versions of each film: an explicit cut and a softer cut.
LaBeouf got his role in Nymphomaniac by sending a tape of himself having intercourse with his girlfriend Karolyn Pho to von Trier. Slater got connected to von Trier via his agent being in Denmark and used makeup under his eyes to make himself look old enough to be Joe's father.
LaBeouf said in August 2012, "The movie is what you think it is. It is Lars von Trier, making a movie about what he's making. For instance, there's a disclaimer at the top of the script that basically says we're doing it for real. Everything that is illegal, we'll shoot in blurred images. Other than that, everything is happening. ... [V]on Trier's dangerous. He scares me. And I'm only going to work now when I'm terrified."
Filming Principal photography occurred between 28 August–9 November 2012 in Cologne and Hilden, Germany, and in Ghent, Belgium.
To produce scenes of simulated sex, von Trier used digital compositing to superimpose the genitals of pornographic film actors onto the bodies of the film's actors. Producer Louise Vesth explained during the Cannes Film Festival:
We shot the actors pretending to have sex and then had the body doubles, who really did have sex, and in post we will digital impose the two. So above the waist it will be the star and the below the waist it will be the doubles.
Gainsbourg and Martin further revealed that prosthetic vaginas and closed sets were used during filming. Martin stated that her acting experience for the film was enjoyable and, after explaining that the film's characters are a reflection of the director himself, referred to the process as an "honour." Martin also stated that shooting the sex scenes was a bit boring due to their technical nature.
Music A seven-track soundtrack was released digitally by Zentropa on 27 June 2014, containing a mix of classical and modern rock music, along with two sound clips from the prologue of the film.
Marketing
In early 2013, the first teaser poster was released from the film's official website. Shortly thereafter, Zentropa released a promotional photo shoot featuring the film's main characters posing in suggestive positions and a list of the film's chapters. This was followed by the release of a picture of Trier himself with duct tape covering his mouth, accompanied by a press release explaining the official launch of the film's campaign.