GASPAR NOÉ REINVENTS CINEMA (AGAIN)

When I saw Gaspar Noé's

Irréversible

in 2002 I was floored. After spending an hour and a half in a dark basement watching people get raped and have their heads smashed in by fire extinguishers, my friend Andy Capper and I left the screening room a little shell-shocked. The switch from Noé's Parisian hell to Soho's afternoon sun was disorientating, and we talked about how the film had affected us. It was energizing.

Irréversible

is a 90 minute rush of adrenaline, as powerful as cinema gets, despite the fact that it was conceived, set up, shot, and completed within weeks. By way of contrast

Enter The Void

, a story Noé has wanted to tell since the early 90s, took five years to make, utilizes an extreme amount of effects, and does lots of things I've never seen before. It's easily the most visceral cinematic experience I've ever had. For hours after I saw it my head was pulsating with the film's Day-Glo images, strobe lights and droning sounds. I'd heard that Noé wanted to portray an out of body experience, and when I

spoke to him

in January, he talked about how much he enjoyed

Avatar

in 3D. Clearly he's determined to push cinema to its limits on every level. "With

Irréversible

, and some of

Enter The Void

," he told me, "both movies are supposed to recreate some sort of altered sensibility or state of consciousness, using cinematic weapons, sound, image, editing, whatever you can use to make it work." Amazingly, he's

really

made it work. He has a minor obsession with Kubrick's

--a poster for that film, selling it as "the ultimate trip," is right there in

Irréversible

, in Vincent Cassel and Monica Bellucci's apartment, but that claim is now

Enter The Void

's to make. This is a 135 minute trip, structurally inspired by

The Tibetan Book Of The Dead

, and aesthetically inspired not only by

's Star Gate sequence, but by

Tron

,

Blade Runner

, and

Altered States

. His own work has informed the film as well. Noé's said that

Irréversible

, with its twirling cameras and long takes, was in some ways a trial run for

Enter The Void

, and the similarities are easy to spot--for the majority of the film the audience sees through the eyes of the junkie Oscar's disembodied, drugged, and dead spirit as it flies through, and over, the city (a neon Tokyo that looks like it's been puked on by the Las Vegas Strip).

As early as the opening credits, which practically jump out of the screen and punch you in the face, it's clear that this is about a lot more than just plot (a family melodrama, essentially), Noé wants us to submit to the film and get lost in it, to feel it. Hallucinogenic scenes with psychedelics play out in real time. Violent scenes are brutally shocking. Sex scenes are graphic and enhanced by gorgeous CG effects. I can't wait to see it again.

Some amazing people have brought this story to life--Marc Caro, co-director of

Delicatessen

and

City Of The Lost Children

is the film's art supervisor. The effects are by Pierre Buffin and his company, Buf, who worked on

Fight Club

, the

Matrix

series, and

Avatar

, while the hypnotic soundtrack is courtesy of Daft Punk's Thomas Bangalter. But above all, this is a film that could only have been made by Noé. Charlie Kaufman says that film, as a medium, is dead--unlike theater. It's locked, it's done, you can't interact with it. But he hasn't seen this.

Enter The Void

feels very, very alive and, in terms of pure cinematic experience, is revolutionary. It comes out in September, and I'd highly recommend doing yourself the favor of seeing it on a big screen. We'll be bringing you more from Noé before then, including a new interview and a documentary we made on the

Enter The Void

set, for

The Vice Guide To Film

. ALEX GODFREY