The orthodox critique of Trier’s films holds him accountable not just for sadism but for misogyny. Out of malice and hatred, we are told, Trier subjects his heroines to unimaginable horrors, brutalizing their minds and mortifying their bodies for the ethically bankrupt satisfaction of his audiences. He makes exploitation films with philosophical pretensions. 

Len Gutkin on “sadomodernism” and the prescribed response to Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac Vol. 1.