Gaspar Noes "Climax" is a Hallucinogenic Nightmare Dance Party and Everyone's Invited

Article by Gabe Zia

When you think of directors like Lars Von Trier, Takashi Miike, David Lynch, or Nicolas Winding-Refn, a few common themes will come to mind. Violence, graphic content, realistic and unsettling gore, tense situations with volatile characters, and just an overall sense of deliberate discomfort. These directors are good at making their audience uneasy, most of the time through how they capture graphic images. However, when it comes to capturing that sensation through purely audio-visual means, without relying heavily on graphic content and more leaning on subtext and how the camera is used, few fit that description more than Gaspar Noé.

Much like all those previously mentioned directors, Noé has made a name for himself in the Art House genre as a disturbing filmmaker. His cult classic film, "Irreversible", saw no less than 250 walkouts during its premiere at the 2002 Cannes film festival, and according to a BBC news report of the premiere, 20 people passed out during the feature. Suffice to say, he's no stranger to his movies being too much for some people. This isn't exactly uncommon, Lars Von Trier and Nicolas Winding-Refn also frequently face walkouts at the infamous film festival, what makes Gaspar Noé special however is his lack of reliance on gore and disturbing imagery.

Don't get me wrong, his films are by no means free of graphic violence, sex, and drugs (and a lot of the time all three of those things in one scene), and while Irreversible might not have so much cult fame if not for an infamous 9-minute one-shot sequence, there's nothing to suggest it's quality would drop significantly, or that it wouldn't be able to be as unsettling without it. It's in his filmmaking technique, the way he uses the camera or colour or sound as tool to instil emotion into his audience that turn his movies into the gut-wrenching nightmares that they are. And his most recent film, "Climax" flawlessly demonstrates that even without horrific sequences of sexual assault or repulsively gorey scenes, he can still make an audience deeply horrified by camera and sound technique alone.

Climax starts out with an outstanding one-shot sequence of the group performing a dance routine, following by continuing this one shot throughout the party, following the various dancers and letting the audience get to know who these people are one by one. This whole sequence lasts as long as an hour, which isn't by accident. By establishing who these characters are early on and firmly rooting that into the audiences head, either through their behavior or through how they dance, Noé is preparing us to have an idea of how these characters are going to react under pressure or when forced into a bad situation. And the use of one-shot sequences is important, one-shots can be fun in action movies but their relevance in movies like this is how they can make an audience feel trapped. Without the camera constantly cutting away, in an uncomfortable situation the audience will begin to feel that lack of a cut, and in turn feel that there is no escape. It's a great trick to make the audience feel paranoid and claustrophobic and this isn't the first time Noé has used it.

However, it's when the nightmarish, emotional, drug trip kicks in that Climax shows its true colours. Not only is the second half of this film filmed entirely in one take (or at least edited to create the illusion that it is, which is still a very impressive feat), but this is where the real meat of Noé's experimental use of the senses comes out to play. As the characters begin to spiral into the bad trip of a lifetime, the audio starts to become crisp, and sharper, before very quitly plunging into binurial sounds that echo around the room like a phantom. The grit and grime of the dirty hallways of the abandoned school are put into focus, the camera starts to drift much closer to its characters than before, the lights start to go down as the colour is accentuated, all the while we're following these characters fall deeper and deeper into their worst nightmares. What makes these sequences especially compelling is that we don't know what their worst nightmares are. We don't actually see their hallucinations or hear their thoughts, we only see the world around them and see them screaming in terror at things we can only imagine. This may sound like it's less frightening, but seeing characters seemingly screaming and losing their minds and attacking each other over something that isn't there is far more compelling than if the movie let us actually see their hallucinations.

Climax isn't a movie for everyone. While it may not match up to the staggering walk-out count Irreversible had, I saw roughly 15 people walk out of Climax during my screening. And I was sure it had nothing to do with enjoyment because it was during some of the most harrowing and upsetting sequences of the movie. So knowing that, I can't realistically assume everyone reading this will love Climax. It's entirely possible that nobody who's reading this will like the movie at all, but I'm not here to tell you what to like. Regardless of whether or not everyone has the stomach for it, Climax is hands down Gaspar Noés best work to date so it's a movie I absolutely have to recommend to everyone, it's something I just think most people should at least try even if they end up hating it. While it may not be out in the States or Canada, it'll likely see it's release in the coming months or at the latest Early 2019, so keep an eye out for this one.