Noe’s Lux Æterna

Benjamin Christensen's Häxan is probably the first horror documentary. Its images are so eerie, it has been excerpted and edited into dozens of subsequent films. (Being in the public domain also makes it attractive.) Once again, it sets the mood for a film about witches, but the lunacy that follows the opening snippets is all Gaspar Noe. First, they talk, then they go crazy in Noe’s Lux Æterna, which opens Friday at the Metrograph.

Throughout the film, Noe uses a split-screen, very much like the so-called “Duo-Vision” of Richard L. Bare’s notorious Wicked, Wicked. Of course, Noe’s film is also all very meta, with the cast playing loosely fictionalized (and improvised) versions of themselves. It opens with director Beatrice [Dalle] talking to her star, Charlotte [Gainsbourg], while the rest of the crew prepare (haphazardly and chaotically) for a big stake-burning scene.

Clearly, Beatrice and Charlotte respect each other, because of their common experiences in the industry. However, the crusty old cinematographer and sleazy producers are openly contemptuous of the inexperienced director (most of whose work has been in front of the camera). It all comes to a head when the shoot nose-dives into Hell, but when that happens on a Noe production, it is simply called a Tuesday.

The film opens with an epileptic strobe warning, with good reason. It is short, but strange—and relentlessly flashing. Lux Æterna is not even an hour long, but it would be hard to watch much more without your eyeballs exploding. A lot of the split-screen use is just as gimmicky as Bare’s 1973 cult favorite, but the visual explosion of the climax is vintage Noe.

Arguably, this is very much a horror film—a pretty shocking one in fact. It just really takes its time on the build-up. After all, there is a long tradition of artsier horror films, gravitating towards witches and witchcraft, including the Visconti/Pasolini/De Sica anthology The Witches and good old Häxan. Like many of those films, there is also a pronounced feminist angle here, particularly when it comes to the film production process. Ironically, Noe might up indicting himself, in retrospect—given what he puts his cast through.

Gaspar Noe’s Climax

These kids are not alright. You’re not too old. Their music is too loud and their drugs are too potent. To be fair, most of the contraband consumed this night was done so involuntarily. Someone spiked the sangria with some unusually strong LSD, turning their rehearsal party into an urban Francophone Lord of the Flies. Brace yourself, because Gaspar Noé has returned to assault viewers’ senses yet again with Climax, which opens today in New York.

It was sort of a rehearsal for these dancers chosen to represent France in an American competition, but anytime they get together there will be sexual tension. The opening number is actually pretty impressive (it was actually choreographed), but from there on out, everyone free dances. All vestiges of social order also start to breakdown when they realize how badly they have been dosed. Initially, they suspect Emmanuelle, because she brought the sangria, but the unruly troupe backs down when they realize she drank too and is now in the same boat. Rather disturbingly, so has her young son Tito. They will turn their rage on two more troupe members, including Lou, who claims she did not imbibe, because she is pregnant. At this point, things really get ugly.

Climax is a total Gaspar Noé film. If that doesn’t mean anything to you, then you should probably avoid it at all costs. Noé has always put the extreme in the New French Extremity, so expect some lurid, shocking stuff. Not to be spoilery, but bad things befall children and pregnant women in Climax. He also revisits one of his favorite themes—incest—albeit almost as an afterthought.

Ironically, Climax could inadvertently serve as an explosive critique of multiculturalism. The dancers are mostly the children of immigrants, of a variety of ethnicities, spanning the entire spectrum of sexual identities. Alas, when their ids are unleashed, they become violent and hateful. It is almost like the ghost of old man Le Pen hovers over the film, whispering “I told you so.”

On a technical level, Climax is quite impressive. Noé’s long takes and restless camera work are quite effective, bordering on the hypnotic. This really isn’t an actor’s showcase. Sofia Boutella is the only established thesp. The rest of the ensemble are professional dancers. However, they are all quite convincing going stark raving mad.

During Enter the Void, Noé essentially approximated the visual and emotional sensations of a bad trip. In Climax, he forces us to witness the maelstrom of bedlam from the claustrophobic perspective of an undrugged bystander, presumably like Lou. It certainly is a memorable experience—memorably unpleasant, but undoubtedly Noé would consider any such visceral response to be a success.

Honestly, your intrepid online film critic just wanted to take a shower after it was over—and not from working up a sweat getting down to the vintage house and electronica music. By this point, you should know full well whether Climax is a film for you or not, so inhale or shun accordingly when it opens today (3/1) in New York, at the Angelika Film Center.

Noe’s Enter the Void

What do you get when you mix together generous helpings of designer drugs, the Tibetan Book of the Dead, an iconoclastic director, and a bunch more drugs? Gaspar Noé’s latest film: Enter the Void (trailer here). Shot in Tokyo by the Argentine-born French director, using a largely American cast, Void is a self-consciously cult film, sure to inspire love and hate in equal measure when it opens this Friday in New York.

Oscar is dying, but Noé is just getting starting. Hooked on DMT, a hallucinogenic that simulates the chemicals released in the brain at the time of death, the expat has become fatally submerged in Tokyo’s drug scene. Tragically, it appears he will be leaving behind his sister Linda. Though they only recently reunited after years of separation in foster-care, they share a deep emotional bond (not incestuous, but seriously codependent).

Indeed, Oscar’s promise to never leave Linda seems to tether his spirit to the terrestrial world, allowing him to watch the aftermath of his death from a God’s eye perspective. We also experience flashbacks to earlier psychological traumas, including the car accident which orphaned the siblings, as part of his psychedelic death rattle.

Void is a trippy brew, explicitly invoking Tibetan Buddhist precepts, when we see Oscar receive a copy of The Book of the Dead from his New Agey stoner buddy Alex. However, the hedonistic scenes at The Void, the techno-hipster strip club his sister performs at, have little affinity with Tibetan asceticism.

On a technical level, Void is bravura filmmaking, completely unlike any previous “head” film. Visual effects director Pierre Buffin’s work dazzles to the point of overwhelming audiences with imagery overload, while Noé and cinematographer Benoit Debie make effective use of the Tokyo backdrop, conveying the seductive menace of the city’s red-light district. Unfortunately, Noé’s coeditors were far too indulgent, allowing the film to fall into a repetitive pattern. After a while, viewers will start looking for an open flame in each successive scene, knowing his camera will eventually swoop into it.

According to Noé, Nathaniel Brown was cast as Oscar because as a first-time actor with ambitions to direct, it was hoped he would easily accept his lack of proper screen time. Since we essentially view the film through Oscar’s POV, aside from oblique glimpses in mirrors, we only see his hands or feet. Yet, Brown is an identifiable presence throughout, which is a tricky accomplishment to pull off, given the circumstances. Paz de la Huerta, soon to be seen in HBO’s Boardwalk Empire, is certainly a credible stripper, but her melodramatic angst gets tiresome. At least real life French expat Cyril Roy projects an intriguing vibe, giving viewers something to hold onto when he is on-screen.

Boldly ambitious, Void would deserve cult classic status had it been maybe an hour shorter. Instead, it keeps revisiting the same territory, wearing down the goodwill of all but the most adventurous of audiences. The work of a genuine auteur in need of a stronger editorial hand, Void opens this Friday (9/24) in New York at the IFC Center.