Happy birthday to Danish director and provocateur Lars von Trier. The controversial filmmaker is currently working on his serial killer drama The House That Jack Built, starring Matt Dillon, Uma Thurman, Riley Keough, Bruno Ganz, and more. It feels like a long way until 2018, the film’s projected release date, but until then we have these very charming, oddball, funny Lars von Trier quotes to keep us company and remind us why we’re enthralled by his films.
“If anyone would like to hit me, they are perfectly welcome. I must warn you, though, that I might enjoy it. So maybe it’s not the right kind of punishment.”
“I come from a family of communist nudists. I was allowed to do or not do what I liked. My parents were not interested in whether I went to school or got drunk on white wine.”
“I don’t know why everybody thinks I’m very, very small. This T-shirt I have now is Ingmar Bergman on a cloud. It was given to me a week ago. I’m not really sure he is on a cloud. I think maybe he went straight to hell, but that we don’t know. ”
“I’m happy that I’m alive. I feel like someone coming back from Vietnam, you know; I’m sure that later on I’ll start killing people in a square somewhere, but right now, I just feel happy to be alive.”
“Basically, I’m afraid of everything in life, except filmmaking.”
“A film should be like a rock in the shoe.”
“Political correctness kills discussion.”
“Forget all the excuses, ‘the childish fascination’ and ‘the all embracing humility’, for this is my confession, black on white: I, Lars von Trier, am but a simple masturbator of the silver screen.”
“I am the best film director in the world.”
“I want to be surrounded by porn people who love me for what I am, who say, ‘Where do you want the erection, where do you want the penetration?’ Where it’s not complicated.”
“Everything is going to Hell, but we should smile all the way.”
“I think it’s really dreary to try to be sober. But I am.”
“If his creation is so great, why does God want us on our knees?”
“I am a man of very many anxieties but doing strange things with the camera is not one of them.”
“I’m not a woman! Let’s make that very clear! Oh I don’t know, maybe I am. I am an American woman. Or 65 percent of me is.”
“The problem with men is that they will always piss up your back, like when all the deer are together in the woods.”
“It’s always been a lie that it’s difficult to make films.”
“I had an almost fetishistic attraction to film technology.”
“My films are about ideals that clash with the world. Every time it’s a man in the lead, they have forgotten about the ideals. And every time it’s a woman in the lead, they take the ideals all the way.”
“I don’t care what people think of me.”