The french movie "irreversible" a slap in the face with reality?

Question

i watched the french movie called irreversible last night, not knowing what it was about, if i knew, i wouldnt of watched it.

with its reversed chronology, with the ending at the start of the film, its camera motion and music, it took me quite a while to figure out what the store was, but then i figured that the next scene would be what happened before the one we had just saw.

i felt like the two most powerful scene, the murder scene, and the truly disturbing rape scene, which i have to say will give me a sense of reality when it comes to just how violent and disturbing some acts can be, and that these acts are actually committed alot in reality, without a doubt, the most disturbing, yet realistic films ever i have watched.

what makes it disturbing is its reality kick, this stuff actually happens, and that is what frightened me to death the most.

has anybody seen this film, and what was your take on it?

serious answers only please

thanks

Answer 1

I had never heard of it until I was watching a Showtime special last year that had with four of the Masters of Horror directors sitting around discussing horror movies. One of them called the murder scene the most disturbing thing he'd ever seen on film so being the good little horror flick chick, I put it down on my Netflix list. I had checked out the movie at imdb.com before I got it just to see what it was about. Interesting that the director purposely put in the background noise at beginning designed to make people feel ill. Well, it worked. I got a terrible headache watching it. Whether it was due to the camera angles, the violence or the background noise, I don't know. It was brutal to say the least. I confess I did watch the murder scene twice though (on "mute" the second time) because I didn't know on the first viewing that the wrong guy had been killed. It made me even more sick to realize that the rapist was standing there watching his friend's skull getting bashed in and actually enjoying it.

I normally love horror movies but this one was just too much, most likely because, as you suggested, the scenes from this movie could really have happened.

Answer 2

i have in fact seen it. i really couldn't keep my eyes on the screen during those two scenes; i kept looking away and awkwardly laughing with my friend.

in general, there are two opinions of this film; one is your own, an in-your-face look at the harsh realities that are out there, and then there's the opinion that this is just an exploitation film, made for shock value.

personally, i don't really know how i feel about it, just that i'll probably never watch it again.

on the technical side, there are things i can appreciate about it, such as the long takes, and the spinning camera in the beginning.

in conclusion Irreversible will probably be one of the most disturbing, intense movies you will ever watch, so don't watch it with your parents, and don't rent it or watch it lightly, and prepare yourself for it

Answer 3

I haven't seen the film in full, however some of it's scenes were shown to my film studies class a few years ago and it shocked me. I think it's a film people should be warned about before they watch - it's very real, but quite a few of my classmates either walked out of the room or said it had really upset them afterwards. It's a very well made film though, not a format that's been followed a lot.

Answer 4

A friend of mine saw this film and told me to never, ever watch it as he found it really disturbing.

Although in some ways this made me want to see it even more, I decided to take his advice for the following reason-

Although I'm sure this film is entirely realistic, which is a lot more than can be said for most of the rubbish that comes out of Hollywood these days, I really don't want to see any more violence, sexual or not.

I live in Peckham, South London and to hear about violence and rape all I need to do is pick up the local paper, not to mention what is going on in Iraq, Ethiopia, Myanmar etc etc

I need to see a film that restores some faith in human nature, not another film with violence and rape for the sake of shocking audiences