This Week in Cinema: Enter the Void

Seen any movies lately?

Ok. Yes, and no.

I bought a ticket for Enter the Void on Saturday night, but I haven't seen any movies. I had an experience at a cinema-- that much I'm sure of.

Here's what happened:

I've only seen a few movies at the Nuart, one of which was El Topo. I like this theater (even though I don't care for their midnight movie selections.) I love obscure movies, even though they sometimes have saggy pacing and peculiar endings.

I picked up the film calendar to the Nuart theater. I read a review that mentioned something about the film being addictive and including an orgy. I watched a trailer (never a good idea) and everything looked correct. Tokyo, death, drugs, nightlife, color, a disembodied narrator... all of my questions were seemingly answered.

Cue the film by Gaspar Noé:

After maybe the greatest title sequence I've ever seen, an immediately predictable druggie-infused narrative plugs into a downtown Tokyo loft, mid-setup. This film is not delivered in a typical 3-act structure... that is to say, it's an atypical 4-act structure-- beginning, replay of the beginning, middle, not-the-beginning-or-middle. There is certainly no end, because the end is only a beginning that we didn't see the first time.

I'm not going to talk about whether this movie was bad or good. There is no need to. I'm not going to tell you to go see this movie or not-- there is no need to do that. We have all seen it, and we all know it is simply itself.

I did not see Irreversible, which apparently Noe did prior to Void. I wasn't intrigued by the buzz surrounding the 10-minute rape scene featuring Monica Bellucci. As far as on-screen rapes go, after viewing Sam Peckinpah's Straw Dogs [spoiler alert: this link contains on-screen rape] and the more recent Girl With a Dragon Tattoo, I know enough to know that if a director decides to develop a film that includes a rape-scene, it is not taken lightly by anyone, and I'd rather watch the film at home.

As far as Monica Bellucci goes, I'd much rather watch Le Pacte des Loups.

But I digress, as Enter the Void, thankfully, is rapeless.

My point, before I lose it ENTIRELY, is that I went to the theater with little idea of the vast array of strangeness in which I was going to bear witness. I was enthusiastic. I drank some wine beforehand, and smoked a lot. I was full of popcorn and comfy in my seat before the film started, and I laughed my ass off at the random preview for the film House that preceded Enter the Void.

My personal reaction was that this film was a waste of time. It was long-- no, every shot was too long. In fact, the film itself could have been half as long without all of the innovative and bullshit floating transition shots. The director took liberties that I feel no creator should ever take with an audience. Moments were obvious or worse-- overtly cliché. The characters were... underdeveloped (not present,) and the story itself was silly to the point that it was something I would have thought was a genius idea when I was, say, 13 years old... just after I'd smoked my first joint.

Nonetheless, I think this was maybe the most important movie I've seen in the last few months, and I think it's probably the most impressive movie I'll see this year. In a way, I hope I'm wrong, but this film does exactly what it wants to.

My skin itched. My thermostat went hay-wire. I developed a throbbing headache that lasted 36 hours (I never get headaches.) My desire to control blinked red, and my sense of understanding dropped away... far, far away.

Yes, I would have made different choices. Yes, I agree with a lot of my friends that modern film is philosophically infantile-- layers of meaning, symbolism, and understatement all seem completely lost to modern writers and directors-- but I still like this traumatic-shitshow of a film.

Watch as much as you can. Watch tv, watch foreign films, listen to radio and bad radio, plug into a couple of infomercials-- and then after all that, turn on Enter the Void. This film is more like a pamphlet of a film you could have made; it's not the thing you came to see. What you're looking for is directly behind it. It is a means to the end, and as a pacifist I disapprove, but as a taoist I understand that an infinite number of roads lead to the same pond.

Thank you for a moment of your time, to discuss Noé's death-defying waste of time on celluloid (most likely not celluloid.)

It's like watching Trainspotting for the first time, again-- or The Jerk. It took me a moment to realize what had happened. It's like seeing Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti live for the first time, again; it took me almost an hour to realize that, yes he was wasted drunk and unintelligable, but damnit: what would Jim Morrison do? Sometimes, art is just crazed and immediately nonsensical, but the good shit stays with you for a while, and then for longer than you'd thought you wanted. Requiem for a Dream proves this principle-- I will never, at any point, need to watch this film again because it damn sure stayed with me the first time (ask Ben Tilden.)

Look at me! I'm not in bed with my sweet, panty-clad lady because-- 3 days later at 2 am-- I find myself compelled to blog about this shitty little 137 minute film!

Read a book. Then watch this film with someone you trust, and a lot of good dope. Take a shot halfway through the 1st of 4 acts, then repeat during each act. Stay at home where your couch and bed are readily available. Invite as many people as you can. Just let it all wash over you, the good, the bad, and the digitally sexual.

Enjoy your reeducation.