Director(s)	Gaspar Noé
Principal Cast	Sofia Boutella as Selva Romain Guillermic as David Souheila Yacoub as Lou Kiddy Smile as Daddy Claude Gajan Maull as Emmanuelle Thea Carla Schøtt as Psyché
Release Date	2018
Language(s)	French, English
Running Time	96 minutes

A woman crawls in the snow leaving bloody markings wherever her body moves. The camera follows her ragged, desperate movement and swirls around her as her body imprints a set of bloody snow angels into the previously white and pure backdrop. The camera slowly pans down passing over a tree, a torrent of branches unfolding in a rhizomatic pattern – an mazelike structure with infinite openings and endings.

Words pop up on the screen informing us the movie is dedicated to “makers who are no longer with us” before indicating that the movie is based on a real event that happened in France, during the winter of 1996. The text “existence is a fleeting illusion” pops up on the screen for a split second, its appearance as fleeting as the message it provides. Then the credits start to play. These first 3 minutes of Gaspar Noé’s climax tell the story of the entire movie while revealing absolutely nothing about what’s to come. A brief impression – violence, beauty, movement, text, beginning, ending, climax – that informs that audience that they are in fact watching a movie, not an illusion of reality.

The postmodern bent continues as the movie cuts to an old fashioned television set , one that you’d see back in ’96, surrounded by a collection of Noé’s favorite books and movies. Titles like Zulawski’s Possession and Argento’s Suspiria are present, letting you know the auteur’s influences and future direction. The screen shows the audition tapes of dancers who are trying out for a troupe. They’re questioned by two off screen presences, one of whom is Noé himself – a director who quite literally places himself in the movie, reminding us that the director’s voice is as part of the movie as anyone else.

The dancers are asked a series of questions involving their relationship to dance, the meaning of what they do, what experiences they’ve had, what they look forward to, and so on. Each dancer only talks for a few moments, giving the audience a brief impression of them and their interests, as their answers reveal the importance of dance as a method of experiencing life and joy – a survival mechanism that lets the body transform into something else. They talk about drugs, sex, sexuality, and the way those elements permeate the dance scene turning the discussion and interview into one about dance as an assemblage – a mechanization of multiple moving parts interacting with the desire of the dancers. Like the tree shown in the introduction, dancing is a rhizome that’s infinitely malleable.

As if to demonstrate this thought the movie cuts from the interviews to a beautifully choregraphed dance sequence that showcases the talent of the dancers. Energetic music pulses through the background setting the stage for the wonderous number that’s about to commence. The camera glides and dips around from multiple different angles without ever cutting, reflecting the way bodies move in an constant ebb and flow among and within each other. Multiple bodies coalesce into a singular entity showcasing the transformative power of dance as a way to break down ones barriers. Finally the group breaks and the pseudo-protagonist of our movie, Selva, proclaims “God is with us”, indicating that the creativity and beauty of the dance piece is a form of spiritual praxis.

Now that the main piece is done, the dancers mingle about one another celebrating their achievement with a festive and joyous party. They drink sangria from the punch bowl and engage in celebration at their accomplishments. The camera follows members of the party (primarily Selva) as everyone interacts with one another. The movie takes the time to cut between different characters conversing with one another, giving the audience a chance to let their impressions of the characters from earlier fill out and grow. There’s an impromptu nature to the dialogue which gives it an earnest realness and helps serve as a contrast to the more extreme intrusions the movie has forced/will force upon us. After a while, the movie cuts to a long individual dance montage, where the dancers show themselves off as their peers crowd around them in a circle cheering whoever is dancing on. This will be the last reprieve before the terror of the movie sets in. At the end of the dance, the credits play again- another beginning, another ending, another climax.

The movie births a new scene that comprises the brunt of the run time and zooms in on a cup of sangria being taken from a pitcher. The focus on the drink is important, because unknown to the characters, the sangria is spiked with LSD and turns the peaceful and energetic party into a chaotic hellscape.

Characters start to lose any and all inhibitions as they become increasingly prone to acting on emotion as opposed to any semblance of reason. They realize something is wrong and a group of them desperately try and figure out who spiked the sangria. The ensuing witch hunt is horrifying to watch, as characters are brutalized by mob style accusations and judgements. Meanwhile, other characters drift off in the background, some of them dancing as though the events occurring in other portions of the dance hall are of no importance to them while others wander aimlessly, struggling to keep an internal coherence.

All the while the neon colors bursting through every shot become threatening as opposed to comforting, highlighting the chaos of the setting. The dance music which previously felt so upbeat and energizing transforms into a pulsating terror, not because the songs or their tempo themselves change, but because the situation they’re playing in is so radically different. At one point, Sofia Boutella channels her inner Isabelle Adjani and performs her own rendition of the infamous Possession subway scene – one of the instances of Noé’s earlier winks to the audience coming to life in his own movie.

As her character struggles to find footing in the topsy-turvy environment, the camera suddenly turns upside down. The dancers who looked so majestic earlier turn into hellish figures, evoking images of gargoyles and other creatures of the night. A heaven turned into hell.

The story of Climax is the story of the Earth – a place of beauty and wonder that goes through bouts of chaos. The dancers represent the different facets of humanity – the good, the bad, the ugly, and the sublime. Their introductions at the beginning of the movies are their representations of themselves – a persona they inhabit and may genuinely believe is indicative of who they are. Dancing is their method of engagement, a way of living among and with each other. It can be beautiful and a sight to see or horrifying and something the eyes want to avert away from. The dancers’ deterioration is not so much a comment on drugs as it is on the hidden desires that lay buried beneath the masks we place. For some of us those desires are ugly, violent, and brutal. For others they’re beautiful, quiet, and loving. Noé ensures this message is clear by ensuring that some of the characters do not partake in the sangria. Their behavior matching those of their peers reflects that these transformations in personality are not substance based, but rather another side, a birth of a new self marked by the death of some other self. The movie even tells us this directly. Near the start of the movie the words “birth is a unique opportunity” pop on the screen. Near the end of the movie the words” death is an extraordinary experience” show up. Life and death- two sides of the same coin – an interplay everything and everybody constantly goes through because stability is fleeting.

The constant interruptions of sections of the movie by either the words or by the presence of new credits tells the audience that every act should be seen as the birth of a new story. Every story has a beginning, middle, and end with its own respective climax. As the movie demonstrates near the end of its runtime, the scene we see at the start of the movie is really the end- a story that starts with a climax and ends with a climax. For what is a climax? A culmination and development of a thread into something spectacular. But if everything lives and dies, if every moment is the birth of something new and the death of what came before, then every second is a climax of its own sort. This is the beauty of the movie – it demonstrates this idea in every way possible, from the structure of the story to the way scenes play out. It’s all a climax and as such it’s all open to the possibility of creativity and/or chaos.

Dance is the vehicle by which the movie explores this idea and Noé uses his impeccable technical skill to translate this idea into an experience. One does not walk away from Climax without going through some intense feelings, whether those feelings are of excitement at the beauty and creative explosion present or disgust and misery at the pain that’s on display. The focus on the movement of the dancers and the constant and energetic soundtrack makes the movie a feast for the eyes and ears. There’s always something visually interesting happening on screen, even if it terrifying. The neon color palette is breathtaking and drips through every single frame.

The incredibly long takes keeps the experience continuous, never giving the audience a moment to breathe or think. This is experiential filmmaking at its finest. I can totally understand people who dislike this movie and see it as a series of random events and dialogue that seemingly proceeds in a haphazard manner. Likewise, I can understand people who hate the movie because of how miserable it ends up feeling. It goes to some dark and disturbing places. But to me, that’s life. It’s a random scattered set of experiences with some semblance of order that is then constantly interpreted by us as we move along its path. There’s good and bad and everything in between. This is a movie that captures that essence and makes everything from the structure of the movie to the narrative proper reflect that feeling.

None of the movie would be possible without the cult of personalities presented by the actors, most of whom have never acted before this. Obviously Boutella is excellent and serves as a kind of character anchor the audience follows to help keep them from getting too lost in the chaotic world Noé creates. Anyone who can do Adjani’s chaotic acting from Possession justice deserves kudos and Boutella nails it. But she’s an actor. It’s no surprise that she can act well. What is surprising is a large majority of the primarily dancer cast is able to keep up with her energy and ability to flip a switch the moment shit hits the fan. The cast is huge, but every single member of it exudes their own unique set of traits that makes them all interesting to follow in their own right. Maull nails a constant anxiety and fear that makes her character seem jumpy and unconfident. Schøtt brings an apathy and an off-kilter vibe that makes Psyché feel like a force of nature more than an actual person. Smile brings a sense of comfort and authority to his aptly named character, Daddy. I could go on and on, but the point is every actor brings something new to the mix giving Climax a surprising amount of depth. In fact, every time I watch the movie I focus on another one of the characters and follow whatever they’re doing when the movie pans to them. Are they embracing creativity or chaos ? How are they acting compared to their previous interview and/or conversations from the earlier acts of the movie? Because of how much time is spent letting the actors breathe life into their characters, you can come away from movie having gotten a plethora of different “narratives”, showcasing the themes mentioned above.

The genius of Climax is despite being unabashedly artistic, experimental, in your face, and provocative it still manages to have time to answer the mystery of who spiked the sangria – saving the reveal for the very last moment of the movie. Based on all previous information, the reveal is poetic and gives the movie a neo-giallo kind of feeling behind all the music and dance. There’s a “masked” killer (the mask being the persona the killer use) whose plans end up causing tremendous amounts of violence, characters desperately try to figure out who the character is with no real success, and the movie ends on the killer’s reveal without ever giving away their motivations, leaving that interpretation up the audience. Having a narrative that ends with an actual answer on top of doing everything else in between is testament to Noé’s strength as an auteur. He doesn’t forget to deal with the main plot despite seemingly not being all at that interested in it.

Now while I think of Climax as an audio-visual poem that uses its dancers as different stanzas in a tale about life, I don’t think the movie is for everyone. I do think those who dislike Noé’s earlier works might find something interesting in this. However, I don’t think those who like a conventional narrative will enjoy this. There is a story. There is a buildup. There is a conclusion. But the movie is more focused on feeling like an experience than giving you a coherent tale. It’s very much inspired by the French New Wave (the movie even tells the audience in one of its text/phrase cutaways that it’s a French film and it’s proud of it) and doesn’t hesitate to let the audience know that this is a movie. It intentionally wants to get a rise out of you. Noé is a provocateur and wants you to feel uneasy and miserable. A lot of people call this movie an exercise in style as opposed to substance and while I disagree as evidenced by my adoration above, I can understand that point of view if you’re coming into it expecting a well-structured story with a clear plot. If you’re someone who enjoys art house proclivities and want an experience that ferociously comes at your sense this is the movie for you. If not, go watch something else. The world is open to infinite possibilities. Go and embrace whatever suits your fancy.

REPORT CARD

TLDR	Climax is an audio-visual experience that demonstrates that style can absolutely be substance. It’s a cinematic poem that explores the multiplicity of life in both its creative splendor and its ability to fall into depravity. The narrative eschews tradition in favor of embracing its themes in every way possible from slides of words that interrupt the action to constantly playing a different version of the credits at interesting points in the movie. All of this is done in service of demonstrating that life is a constant process of birth and death- an infinite series of climaxes where anything can happen. The dance sequences are mesmerizing and the music is hypnotic. The depravity is heartbreaking and revolting without ever losing its sense of beauty. Shots are draped in neon colors and constant movement which makes every moment visually arresting. The story of a dance troupe falling into disarray after drinking spiked sangria is only a small portion of the movie despite “being” the main narrative. To get the full experience, you have to be willing to take a leap of faith into Noé’s rhizomatic world.
Rating	10/10
Grade	A+

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