Gaspar Noe's 'Irreversible'
What will we find if we backtracked our lives to the beginning, the very beginning? This is the question Gaspar Noe asks in his ingeniously constructed riddle 'Irreversible.'
A beautiful woman named Alex (Monica Bellucci) is brutally raped in a subway just moments after seeing her boyfriend in the arms of another woman. When Marcus (Vincent Cassel) sees Alex on a stretcher he vows revenge and embarks on a journey that ends at an S&M club called The Rectum where he finds the man who destroyed his Alex, the man known as The Tenia. Afterwards, a series of effects and causes backtrack to the beginning and the chain of events leading to the Rectum. Some choices we make can be changed and others are immutable.
Gaspar Noe’s ‘Irreversible’ is not a film, it is an experience and a most strange tribute to Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey that you have to see to believe. No matter how many times I see this film, the effect it has on me is as profound as the 1st time. You either love this film or you hate it, there's no in between. Irreversible’s non-linear structure makes Tarantino's 'Pulp Fiction' and Nolan's 'Memento' look like kids stuff. Be warned, though, if you haven't seen it yet that it is extremely graphic and contains a brutal rape scene that fits within the context of the story.
