Reviews for this film from our members:
- Marco Albanese @ Stanze di Cinema (Vol. I) [Italian]
- Excerpt: Il film ha un ritmo meditativo e ipnotico, non tutto appare perfettamente riuscito ed alcune cadute di tono le avremmo volentieri evitate, ma Von Trier è da sempre un regista che divide trasversalmente i suoi spettatori.
- Marco Albanese @ Stanze di Cinema (Vol. II) [Italian]
- Excerpt: In Von Trier finisce per prevalere la voglia di un ultimo sberleffo, la provocazione fine a se stessa che si fa gioco persino della coerenza drammatica.
- Dragan Antulov @ Draxblog VI (Vols. I & II) [Croatian]
- Marina Antunes @ Quiet Earth (Vol. I)
- Marina Antunes @ Quiet Earth (Vol. II)
- Jason Bailey @ Flavorwire (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac is less a disciplined, focused motion picture than an all-you-can-eat buffet where the director overloads his plate, and encourages his audience to do the same.
- Jason Bailey @ Flavorwire (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: It’s a wandering, freeform exploration of the themes, subjects, and ideas of particular interest to the filmmaker — and sex is among them, certainly, but it doesn’t seem to be his primary focus, or destination.
- Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
- Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: A creative drama about a female sex addict whose adventures are a tuning fork for ethics, philosophy, intimacy and loneliness.
- Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: A disappointing and depressing finale to a sex addict’s journey.
- Kevin Carr @ 7M Pictures (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: While confusing when taken on its own merits, the second half works to resolve some of the questions behind character motivations, and that’s why it works as a companion piece.
- Kevin Carr @ 7M Pictures (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: von Trier walks the line between art-house intellectualism and art-house voyeurism
- Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Leave it to provocateur writer/director Lars von Trier to wrap a philosophy on nature and science vs. love and religion in headline grabbing sensationalism.
- Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
- Excerpt: …one really needs to see the two together to feel the potent if perverse exhilaration Martin’s Joe experiences as she gives in unreservedly to her pathology in part I, before society and her own body punish Gainsbourg’s Joe so brutally for transgressing into what is the traditionally masculine domain of sexual freedom.
- Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Von Trier makes no attempt in these early chapters to explain or psychoanalyze Joe’s compulsion for sexual pleasure, and neither—and more importantly—does he look upon Joe in judgment.
- Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: [I]n its second section, the film becomes a much darker and, more importantly, richer exploration of its characters and their questions of identity.
- Dustin Freeley @ MoviesAboutGladiators.com (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: If Joe (Gainsbourg) is addicted to sex, then von Triar is addicted to exposition.
- Dustin Freeley @ MoviesAboutGladiators.com (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: This film dispatches with much of the inane analogies and focuses on the root of many societal ills, language.
- MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com (Vols. I & II)
- Excerpt: A salacious yet also tedious portrayal of a woman who would appear to confirm all the nastiest stereotypes about women. Completely unfun, unpleasant, unerotic, and unenlightening.
- Jeremy Kibler @ The Artful Critic (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Staggering but unmoving, daring but off-putting, this 118-minute half-movie works in individual scenes, but it’s all so lugubriously apathetic—even shockingly tedious—and unsatisfying after the shock value has worked its desensitizing effect.
- Jeremy Kibler @ The Artful Critic (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: If “Volume I” wasn’t your cup of kaffe, “Volume II” deserves an even wider berth, going down like black tar.
- Matthew Lucas @ From the Front Row (Vols. I & II)
- Excerpt: Brash, bold, erotic, messy, mesmerizing, and ultimately cathartic; a kind of neo-feminist allegory that synthesizes sex, philosophy, religion, and politics as only Von Trier could do it.
- Carson Lund @ In Review Online (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Ending with a mid-coitus cliffhanger and a Volume 2 preview, this work feels fundamentally unfinished, as though its maker arbitrarily spliced it around its midway point to get as much distribution and publicity mileage out of the event as possible. That said, this first installment of Nymphomaniac is an unexpected creation that points towards what may be a fascinating step for Von Trier.
- Carson Lund @ In Review Online (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: In the straightforwardness of its narrative outline, the transparent emptiness of its metaphors, and the bludgeoning lack of subtlety of its final not-quite-paradigm-shift, Nymphomaniac stakes a wide-ranging attack on normative values and tastes.
- Mike McGranaghan @ The Aisle Seat (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Only in a Lars von Trier film would you find yourself asking the question, “What was more daring: the aspect ratio change or the penis montage?”
- Matthew McKernan @ FilmWhinge (Vols. I & II)
- Excerpt: Nymph()maniac is a difficult but fascinating film that can either mean nothing at all or is brimming with ideas and themes.
- Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix (Vol. I)
- Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix (Vol. II)
- Frank Ochieng @ Focus of New York Magazine (Vol. II)
- Excerpt: Danish auteur Lars von Trier’s raw and probing Nymphomaniac: Volume II is the continuation of one lost woman’s downward spiral into the aimless sexual landscape of confusion, desperation and despair…an unflinching female empowering spotlight into an unpredictable territory of erratic behavior that is more commonplace than what any of us is willing to admit.
- Frank Ochieng @ Focus of New York Magazine (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Danish filmmaker Lars von Trier’s provocative Nymphomaniac: Volume I is indeed a shocking character study of psycho-sexual dependency at the hands of womanly disillusionment. Gloriously dark, titillating and demonstrating a fine line between an observational carnal expose and tawdry exploitation.
- R. Kurt Osenlund @ SouthPhillyReview.com (Vol. I)
- Tiago Ramos @ Split Screen (Vol. I) [Portuguese]
- Tiago Ramos @ Split Screen (Vol. II) [Portuguese]
- Francis Rizzo III @ DVDTalk.com
- Excerpt: Sex and naked people and genitals and sadness
- Norm Schrager @ Meet In the Lobby (Vol. II)
- Norm Schrager @ Meet In the Lobby (Vol. I)
- Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Just as with Harvey Weinstein’s famous mistake of splitting Quentin Tarantino’s “Kill Bill” into two parts, the producers of Lars von Trier’s 240 minute film have seen fit to split it in two, rather than deliver the movie as the filmmaker intended. Big mistake.
- Ron Wilkinson @ ItsJustMovies.com (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: Aside from the outrageous format, this film offers several powerful performances and sheds light on a subject that needs it.
- Andrew Wyatt @ Look/Listen (St. Louis Magazine) (Vol. I)
- Excerpt: The film kindles profound empathy for its protagonist, despite her callous behavior, drawing the viewer into her tale through fascination mingled with pity.
