(Not) Sorry, It's Lars Von Trier

I thought I was a Jew for a long time and was very happy being a Jew... I really wanted to be a Jew, and then I found out that I was really a Nazi... Which also gave me some pleasure... What can I say? I understand Hitler. But I think he did some wrong things, yes, absolutely... I'm just saying I think I understand the man. He's not what you would call a good guy but I... yeah, I understand much about him and I sympathize with him a little bit... Okay, I'm a Nazi.
--Excerpts from Lars von Trier's answer to a question at a Cannes Film Festival press conference


For someone who thinks in the way that Lars von Trier thinks, the idea of saying "sorry" was not a simple one. "I don't think there is a right or wrong thing to say. I think that anything can be said. That is very much me. The same with film--anything can be done in a film. If it can be thought in a human mind, then it could be said and it could be seen on a film. Of course you get troubles for it afterwards, that's for sure, but that doesn't make it wrong. To say I'm sorry for what I said is to say I'm sorry for what kind of a person I am, I'm sorry for my morals, and that would destroy me as a person. It's not true. I'm not sorry. I am not sorry for what I said. I'm sorry that it didn't come out more clearly. I'm not sorry that I made a joke, but I'm sorry that I didn't make it clear that it was a joke. But I can't be sorry for what I said--it's against my nature."

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He talks about Proust's veneration of great works of art and church windows. "That gives me some joy, but I still think life is a terribly bad idea." He says that if God created life--"which I sincerely doubt"--he didn't think it through. "I think you should have a say when you're born--'Is this really something you want to do?'"

--from Chris Heath's Lars Attacks! in GQ US' October 2011 issue