Nymph()maniac Joe (Charlotte Gainsbourg) continues to tell her soporific tale of sex addiction and S&M to asexual stranger Seligman (Stellan Skarsgård).I surely deserve some kind of medal for watching Nymph()maniac Volumes 1 and 2 back-to-back; either that or I need my head examining. Like the first film, this second volume is wall-to-wall pseudo-intellectual tripe with a little hardcore sex and some S&M to spice things up. Actually, scrap that… it's more like a hardcore sex and S&M movie with some pseudo-intellectual claptrap in an effort to validate it as a work of art and not just extremely bad porn.It's hard to say who or what I hated most about this film, since virtually every frame irked me, but if I had to choose it would be both Skarsgård and Gainsbourg, whose lifeless performances threaten to put the viewer into a coma, Jamie Bell's irritating turn as professional masochist K (I have hated almost everything I have seen him in) and Shia La Beouf as Jerome (I've hated almost everything I have seen him in too).Having now sat through three Lars Von Trier movies, the other being the barely watchable Antichrist, I can now say that I am officially done with this director.

Ho-hum!... Well - Here we go again!.... Nymphomaniac, like "Shame" and "Looking For Mister Goodbar", is yet another sordid, unsavoury, and totally sneering look at the consequences that are apparently supposed to result from excessive promiscuity.When it comes to sheer heavy-handedness - This shamelessly preachy, little picture self-righteously tells the viewer that having lots of sex with many partners is a hateful thing (so don't you dare love it).This is the sort of movie that neither stimulates the mind nor arouses the libido. Nope. It absolutely numbs both. If you are expecting Nymphomaniac to live up to its title as being an intensely pleasant and wildly erotic experience, you are definitely in for a major disappointment.Incompetently directed by Lars Von Trier (who must be an utterly despicable prig) - Nymphomaniac amounted to being nothing but a dreary, little soap opera (with lots of graphic sex thrown in for good measure) that took 4 frickin' hours to get its shallow, sex-hating point across..... Sheesh! Like - Hey! Give me a break, already!

I admit to having mixed feelings about so much negativity regarding Nymphomaniac. Yes, Nymphomaniac is a single 5 hour film. Much like previous attempts to separate films into two features (Kill Bill, The Matrix sequel), these "two" films do not work separately. Also, I imagine many are viewing the theatrical releases, versions neither edited nor approved by director Lars Von Trier, who instead of creating two shorter "watered down" visions deferred to his assistant and instead focused on he director's cut. And that is where this film comes alive. It saddens me that the casual film-goer would dismiss such an ambitious, challenging, cumulatively awe-inspiring composition, yet un-surprised by the lazy and prudish instinct when it comes to empathizing with both stigmatized femininity, taboo sex and fear of something bold.As a single, sprawling opus, Nymphomaniac comprehensively confronts the realities of sex from the point of view of a woman, tracking her along the many emotional highs and lows through her life. Many have been put off by the (at times) graphic sex and "other" imagery, but the unflinching nature of these scenes is meant to convey the truth of her at first shameless and, gradually, self-judgmental self image, as she is slowly broken down by culture. It is a glorious, painful, and ultimately, triumphant protest for female empowerment, for female voice, albeit clothed in appropriately harsh packaging, and a reminder that even in such seemingly liberated times, women are still slaves to expectation, to morality, to public and patriarchal pressure, not their own desire, and the film is a harsh critic of this. Confronting difficult or ignored topics is rarely comfortable, and this film holds nothing back in passionately and comprehensively defining the prison of culture so many women aspire to transcend.

I'm going to keep it straight to the point. Just when I thought, after vol. 1 that it couldn't get worse, along comes the nadir of blackness and utter hopelessness. I know Von Triers from "Dancer In The Dark", a film that I liked but found nearly unbearable to watch and only saw once and never want to see again. I recognize the talent, however, and braced myself for another helping. Little did I know what I was really in for. The bottom line is that these films depict a world inhabited by people that are desperately and hopelessly doomed. I've never seen such nihilistic portrayals in my life. I'm all for "realism" in films but I don't want to be thrown into the "real lives" of these people....no, no a thousand times no! Their world is so bleak and hopeless and devoid of any affection or warmth or light that it simply looses any sense to it. The lives of these people have not an iota of the elements that make living worthwhile so once that's realized, after about a minute, it becomes pure torture. I pride myself on my level of tolerance for the fetishes and idiosyncrasies that people have but sheer brutality is something that I know exists but care not to be thrown into in brutal graphic detail. These are the most bleak and depressing films ever made to my knowledge.