Constance is a 1998 feminist erotic film directed by Knud Vesterskov and produced by Puzzy Power, a division of Lars von Trier's film company Zentropa. It was the first hardcore pornographic film ever to have been produced by an established mainstream film studio.^[1]

Constance is based on the Puzzy Power Manifesto^[2] developed by Zentropa in 1997, and was the first in a series of pornographic films aimed particularly at a female audience.^[3] The others would be Zentropa's Pink Prison (1999) and All About Anna (2005).

A young woman, Constance (Anaïs), arrives at the mansion of the experienced Lola (Katja Kean), where she is initiated into the mysteries of sexuality. The story is told in flashback via a framing device with lyrical diary excerpts and narration read by mainstream actresses Christiane Bjørg Nielsen and Hella Joof. (In the English-language version, narration is by Danish actress Susan Olsen and Helle Fagralid).

The film was shown in mainstream cinemas in Europe, and was reviewed by mainstream film critics.^[4] The Stockholm Film Festival arranged a special screening in Stockholm on Valentine's Day.^[4]

Constance became a considerable success, and generated considerable hype, especially in Scandinavia.^[4] It was nominated for three AVN Awards: Best Art Direction - Video; Best Music; and Best Videography. The reaction of film critics was "mixed."^[4]

In 2006, it was in part this film's claim of mainstream audience viewing behind a process that ended up with porn being legalized in Norway.^[5]

In September 2007, German weekly magazine Stern wrote: "Women too like to see other people having sex. What they don't like is the endless close-ups of hammering bodyparts without a story. Lars von Trier is the first to have realised this and produced valuable quality porn films for women."^[6]