Enter the Void

Once we had made a decision about the overall theme of our drama project, it was recommended by a member of my group that I watch Gaspar Noe's Enter The Void. From the moment the title sequence arrived on screen, I knew I was in for something spectacular. A series of graphics with the film's credits flickered across the screen in bright, strobing colours, the shifts in text becoming ever-more impressive. Once the film finally began, it was immediately clear that the cinematography was carefully considered, and executed in a way that perfectly suited the narrative unfolding on screen. Involving much stabilised handheld camera-work, the dialogue at the beginning was interesting to watch, set as it was in vibrant downtown Tokyo. As the film progressed, it began to turn to POV shots involving the protagonist, which soon became impressive during a sequence in which he smoked DMT, a powerful hallucinogenic drug. After a shift in the lighting of his apartment, a glance to the ceiling showed an impressive CGI sequence of geometric and organic shapes and colours, shifting and filling the screen. The scene was stretched over a long period, and I suspect we were taken through the entire six-minute duration of a DMT trip.

Early on during the film, the protagonist is shot by police in a toilet cubicle. The remainder of the film demonstrates the meticulous attention to cinematography and to staging that Gaspar Noe is known for. Sweeping overhead shots dominate, a mixture of crane shots, helicopter shots and CGI allowing us in a strange POV to transition vast distances across Tokyo from a bird's-eye view, through walls and over rooftops to follow the close relatives and acquaintances of the protagonist's life. Seamless transitions take us through places as bizarre as through a kitchen plughole, into sequences of bright shifting colours and back into other locations. In many places we are transported into the character's past, witnessing his memories through a mixture of POV and over-the-shoulder shots.

The entire film is structured to fit in with two main elements: the experience of a DMT trip (Noe did his 'research' in Mexico before making the film), and the Tibetan Book of the Dead. The book deals with what happens to an individual after death and before rebirth, aiming to guide them through the process; the similarity between phenomena described in the book and the hallucinogenic experience has been pointed out many times, most famously by Timothy Leary in his book, The Psychedelic Experience.

Though the cinematography of Enter The Void is staggering, and the CGI used tastefully and extremely effectively, my criticisms of the film begin with its length against its content. Great portions of the film take place in which nothing happens to advance the plot, focussing perhaps too much on the formal techniques used in order to allow the viewer to savour them. This creates a situation in which we await the next event in boredom much of the time. Another negative aspect is Gaspar Noe's inclusion of copious amounts of sex in the film, bordering of misogyny. Many of these sexual encounters displayed by the film are unnecessary, I felt, for the plot, and seem to be included above all to maintain the interest of the less patient viewer through a cheap trick.

Despite these flaws, however, the film is a great inspiration for our project and for my filmmaking overall, and I rate it as one of the most spectacular films I have ever had the pleasure of seeing.