43 Lars von Trier Movies, Ranked Best to Worst

Grace Mulligan is given refuge from gangsters by the people of Dogville, an American town, in exchange for doing small chores. But things take a darker turn when chores turn into torture and rape. When Grace finally accepts her identity of being the gang leader’s daughter she burns the town and its people to the ground. 

Dancer in the Dark is the story of a young East European immigrant, who comes to the USA with her young son with a dream in her eyes. Struggling to survive, herself suffering from degenerating eye condition, she continues to save money so that her son can undergo surgery to save his eyesight. But fate is not kind to her and she ends up being labeled as a communist sympathizer and murderer. 

A religious Scottish young woman Bess McNeil, who is naïve in her beliefs, falls in love and marries Jan Nyman, a Danish oil-rig worker. When an accident aboard the rig paralyses him, Bess blames herself for praying for his return. Jan impels her to have sex with other men, which initially shocks her but she starts believing that God is guiding her. 

Europa is a drama thriller film which takes us to the time after the end of the Second World War. A young idealistic American of German descent tries to help the German people, and takes up a railway job in Germany. However, he soon gets involved in a terrorist conspiracy.

The second installment of Lars von Trier’s Depression Trilogy, Melancholia follows the two sisters Justine and Claire. The severely depressed Justine and the fearful Claire must come to terms with their destinies as a rogue planet named Melancholia heads on a direct collision course towards Earth.

This Danish historical drama film, tells the story of a young queen, married to an insane king. She falls in love with her physician, and the two eventually start a revolution that leads to the nation changing. 

In 1933, while traveling through Alabama, Grace Mulligan and her father come across a plantation, ‘Manderley,’ where slavery still persists. Repulsed by the owner’s rules for the slaves, Grace intervenes. Although some of her suggestions backfire, but by harvest time, she succeeds in applying rules of democracy to white owners and black slaves. Eventually, it is Grace who learns the most from the experience. 

When a mysterious killer takes the lives of several young girls, a former detective named Fisher decides to take up one final case. Unable to find the culprits, he turns to Osborne, a writer who is known for his contribution to the field of criminology. Following the theories put forward in a book named ‘The Element of Crime’, Fisher tries to retrace the steps of the suspect.  

Jorgen Leth has created a striking short film ‘The Perfect Human’ in 1967, which revolved around a man and a woman sitting in a box, while the narrator poses questions regarding their relationship and humanity. Danish director Lars von Trier challenges Jorden years later, to remake the film using a different set of circumstances.

A young woman Joe, badly injured from a beating, is found unconscious in a dark lane by a man named Seligman. She refuses his offer to call an ambulance and police and he ultimately takes her to his apartment. While he takes care of her, she reveals that she is a nymphomaniac and tells him about her erotic experiences since adolescence.

This is the second volume of a two part erotic art film created by Lars von Trie.  In this volume, Joe, a self-diagnosed nymphomaniac, continues to recount her erotic experiences to Seligman, a bachelor who has brought her home after she was assaulted. In this volume, she delves deeper into her adulthood before recounting how she came to be assaulted, which finally helps her to find peace.   

Karen is dining in a restaurant when few mentally disturbed people enter and disrupt everyone’s peace. Soon it seems that the group is behaving like ‘idiots’ in public, just to prove a point.

While a couple is busy having sex, their toddler son dies falling from the bedroom window, leaving the mother grief-stricken. The father, a therapist, decides to treat her himself and takes her to an isolated cabin in a woods where she spent a previous summer with the boy. However, she becomes maniacal amidst ominous natural occurrences.

This anthology film is a collection of 33 different short films, where the directors expresses their ideas and feelings regarding cinema.

For years, the owner of an IT company has pretended that the real boss lives in America, and communicates with all their staff only by email. The purpose of this is to attribute all the unpopular decisions to the 'absentee boss'. However, things get complicated when a prospective buyer wants to meet the ‘real boss’ in person, and the owner is forced to hire an actor to portray him.

In a small town in the US, a group of teens sharing an interest in guns, decides to form a gang named the Dandies led by Dick Dandelion. Despite the fact that they all carry guns, they all follow a code of pacifism. Along with his gang, Dick tries to protect his childhood nanny Clarabelle, when she is threatened by other gangs.

This war drama film tells the story of a German Officer, who, after the occupation of Denmark ends, pays a visit to his Danish mistress. 

This short film shows us a boy planting a flower on a plot of empty land, even though construction trucks are driving all around, hinting that the flower may be end up destroyed in some way soon.

This short film revolves around a man who finds himself being haunted by a masked stranger.

Good Night, Dear is one of the first short films by Lars von Trier, where a bank employee is shown being subjected to a brutal robbery.

Menthe - la bienheureuse is a short film based on a novel which tells the story of a voluntary female submission.

Victor Marse is a young artist of Jewish descent, who has shunned his heritage, and soon arrives at the realization that he is alone. He starts doubting humanity’s willingness to help each other, and meanwhile, he starts falling for a young nurse named Eliza.

The stop motion, cardboard animation which is Lars von Trier’s directorial debut, features a Super Sausage. When a group of bunnies are frolicking around, one of them gets abducted by some strange troll-like creatures. Then the anthropomorphized sausage, the Super Sausage, comes to the rescue and rides a whale with other two bunnies as they travel underwater to save the kidnapped one.