Danish film director Lars von Trier stunned his audience at the Cannes film festival on Wednesday by saying that he sympathized with, and understood, Adolf Hitler. “OK, I’m a Nazi,” he told a news conference, which reacted with nervous laughter and surprised silence.

Actress Kirsten Dunst, sitting next to Von Trier, seemed very ill at ease with the comments of the director, who has a history of provocative and controversial comments. In 1989, Von Trier discovered that his his biological father was a German, Fritz Michael Hartmann. Von Trier, who is presenting his new film ‘Melancholia’ at the Cannes film festival, also said that Israel was ‘a pain in the ass’.

Here is the trailer to Melancholia: