In a bleak alleyway, Seligman (Stellan Skarsgård) finds Joe (Charlotte Gainsbourg), bloody and battered, and invites her back to his austerely furnished home to tend to her wounds. In return, Joe narrates for him her quixotic life story as a self-diagnosed nymphomaniac, delineating her various trysts and encounters in increasingly graphic detail. Von Trier, no stranger to provocative material, depicts her tales as a series of lurid, often blackly humorous, vignettes, the first film focusing primarily on her teenage exploits, with young Joe being brilliantly played by Stacy Martin.

Notes by David O’Mahony

Screening as part of Lars von Trier: Enduring Provocations. Multi-film pass available.