Danish auteur, enfant terrible Lars von Trier is at it again with what will surely be another provocative piece of cinema when his next film, Nymphomaniac, which is expected to make its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May, debuts.

The highly-anticipated film, von Trier's follow-up to 2011's melancholic Melancholia, stars Charlotte Gainsbourg (who's become a von Trier muse it seems, starring in his last 3 films), Stellan Skarsgard, Shia LaBeouf, Uma Thurman and Jamie Bell.

Here's the official synopsis for Nymphomaniac:

The film is a wild and poetic story of a woman's erotic journey from birth to the age of 50 as told by the main character, the self-diagnosed nymphomaniac, Joe (Gainsbourg). On a cold winter's evening the old, charming bachelor, Seligman (Skarsgård), finds Joe beaten up in an alley. He brings her home to his flat where he cares for her wounds while asking her about her life. He listens intently as Joe over the next 8 chapters recounts the lushly branched-out and multi-faceted story of her life, rich in associations and interjecting incidents.

There've been reports that von Trier will cut 2 versions of the film: a sanitized R-rated cut, and an NC-17 version. His 2009 film, Antichrist, which featured a scene in which a man's (Willem Dafoe's) genitals are mutilated (amongst other things), was released without an MPAA rating because it was most certainly going to get an NC-17 rating.

Nymphomaniac reportedly will feature sex scenes with real penetration. And even though that hasn't yet been confirmed, I wouldn't put it past von Trier.

So what to make of this new photo still (above) from the film that surfaced earlier today, featuring a half-naked Charlotte Gainsbourg, in a sandwich between two black men, suggesting a sexually-charged scenario… I suppose it could be one of the many nympho stories she recounts to Skarsgård's character while he nurses her back to health after finding her beaten up in an alley. One can only assume that her sexual exploits, each one likely increasing in risk from one to the next, are what lead to her being beaten up and left in an alley.

I couldn't help but immediately think of those now infamous Mandingo Parties. Not familiar with what those are? Click HERE to catch up.

What Lars von Trier has in store for us this time around, is anyone's guess; but, really, at this point, if you're familiar with his past work (Breaking the Waves, The Idiots, Manderlay, and others), nothing at all he does on film should surprise. So I'm ready for anything…