ENTER THE VOID trailer from Trinity Films on Vimeo.

French director Gaspar Noé’s third film Enter the Void is not an easy movie to sit through, and I mean that in the best way possible.  During the film’s daunting 154 minute run time, I felt uncomfortable, scared, upset and sometimes even dizzy, but I was never bored.  The film begins with a rapid-fire opening credits sequence that overloads your senses before you even see the first shot of actual film.  And from that point on, your brain is never really given a chance to turn back on.  The film’s protagonist “Oscar” is a 20-something year-old orphan living in Tokyo with his sister and his friend Alex.  The film is shot from first person perspective, making you feel like you are experiencing the events literally through Oscar’s eyes (yes, this includes the screen going black every time he blinks).  Throughout the opening scenes, Oscar experiments with various illicit substances, spawning long sequences of drug-induced hallucinations.  From this point on, the audience is taken on an intense and often frightening journey through Oscar’s past, his death, and his afterlife.  As Oscar’s mind hurtles through a psychedelic vision of Tokyo, he watches his friends and family as they react to his death.  There are times when you want him to look away, and there are times when you want to stay in a scene longer; but the movie gives you a feeling that this journey is as uncontrollable as death itself.  Like a bad drug trip, there is nothing you can do but wait for it to be over, which is exactly the feeling that Noé intended.  Most people will find the film too intense or abstract to enjoy, but the people who do make it through to the end will have experienced something unquestionably unique.  This may not be a drug that you want to take more than once, but it is an experience like nothing you have ever seen, or will ever see again.