10 Best Horror Movie Opening Scenes Of The 2000s

Lars von Trier is a born trickster, and by the time Antichrist hit screens, viewers already knew to expect the unexpected going in - that the film, purportedly about Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg’s unnamed couple struggling to come to terms with the sudden loss of their infant son, was going to be packing something harder than its premise. And, naturally, a movie called Antichrist has certain expectations to deliver on, expectations von Trier subverts and lives up to from the off.

The picture opens on Dafoe and Gainsbourg’s characters having graphic sex in the shower, while their unattended child escapes from his play area and makes his way towards an open window. As their passion reaches its climax, so does the boy’s life, as he tumbles into the snowy void and lands broken on the street below.

Now, there is nothing epic or satisfying about this opening, but it’s hard to deny how good it is. Not only does it set up the film, but it gives us those squirmy, uncomfortable feelings from the outset, pairing graphic sex with death and putting us on the back foot. What makes it effective is how good it looks - the scene is set to classical music and shot like a perfume advert, in dreamy, rich slow-motion black and white, capturing every drop of water in the shower, every thrust of the genitals, and every step of the child making his way to the window…