Gaspar Noé is one of them directors where most people haven’t seen his movies, like me I’ve never heard of the guy, but until recently his recent film Climax sparked my attention, after a quick google search of his other filmography I noticed he directed a film called Irréversible, now I love films that cause controversy, mainly cause I love seeing what all the fuss was about, oh how I now believe the old adage curiosity killed the cat!

Irréversible follows Vincent Cassel as he searches Paris for the man who raped his girlfriend, the film is told in reverse chronological order, it starts off with Cassel’s character being carted off on a stretcher with a broken arm, we then he how said arm ended up getting broken, he’s trying to find the bloke who raped his girlfriend, upon seeing a guy he beats him up the guy then breaks Cassel’s arm thus revealing how he broke it, then we get the first of many brutal scenes, one of Cassel’s chums gets a fire extinguisher and savagely and rather brutally bludgeons the poor sods brains in.

We then see the characters savagely beating up a cab driver, then cutting to the characters questioning a sex worker who was the rapists previous victim, hesitant she declines but one of the guys holds a shard of glass to her throat, they are then chased by some really angry sex workers and a couple of guys split up and go different ways, Cassel’s girlfriend Alex is revealed to be in a coma following the rape, he sees her bludgeoned body on a stretcher thus setting up the rest of the film, we then cut to Alex played by Monica Bellucci leaving a party trying to hail a taxi she gives up and goes down an underpass where she comes across the sex worker that Cassel was questioning, she is beaten up by the bloke their trying to search for.

Now I’m gonna stop right there, for those who really don’t like graphic details stop reading now!!! You have been warned!!!! The bloke then attacks Alex and… proceeds to rape her… and yes you see and hear fucking everything, the scene lasts for ten minutes and is uninterrupted it’s all one long continuous shot.

Now this is the reason why the film garnered massive controversy, the rape scene and of course the fire extinguisher scene too, now I love foreign movies I do, but sometimes there’s a film that comes along and shocks the shit outta you, Irréversible is that film, now Gaspar Noé with this film really pulls no punches at all, the scenes are very very hard to watch especially the infamous rape scene, but woah! The cinematography is A plus! The score as well is amazing, I read somewhere that they used low sounding audio to make the viewer feel uneasy and sick, and good god it does the job, from the opening scene your on the edge of your seat from the word go!

To say I liked this film would be wrong, I mean it’s well shot I’m not disputing that, but certain scenes are really really unwatchable, five times I had to turn away and gag, all in all it’s a damn depressing film, and it’s definitely the type of you say “yep I’m only watching that film once” I’d give this film a dare I say it but 8/10.

I’m basing it on the cinematography and the score, nothing else!!! But as always guys until next time catch ya later 🙂