Review of Irreversible (2002) by Ollie C — 26 Feb 2010

The first thing you'll notice is the whole film runs backwards. It starts with the end credits and then the scenes run in reverse order. Most people also don't like the way the camera works. It spends the first 20 minutes of so spinning round which is really disorientating. I thought it was quite clever as it's meant to make you feel uneasy, to aid this they play a low frequency tone throughout as well which affects people and makes then feel nautious (sp?) and dizzy, you can't hear it as it's barely audible but it's there.

From a technical standpoint the film is amazing. All the scenes are done in one take with a single camera. The script was only three pages long and most the film was improvised. There's around 13 scenes in total and all the timings and acting is spot on and the camera is always in the right place at the right time. It's really gritty and horrible and contains some intense scenes which I'll come onto in a minute.

When this film was shown at a film festival it had loads of people walking out, this may either be due to feeling dizzy and sick or due to not being able to handle some of the intense scenes in this film. The acting is great and realistic so deserve a pat on the back for that.

Now I'm going to briefly describe a couple of the nasty bits, they're not really spoilers as such but if you're planning on watching it and don't want it ruined at all then skip the next bit.

Anyway there's a scene early on (which is at the end of the film but the start as it's running backwards) where the two main characters are going round this gay sex club trying to find a guy who did some horrible things (which is shown in a later scene) they find him and then the scene gets kinda sick and twisted. I won't reveal what happens but it's not pleasant to watch. I'd love to know how they managed to film all of it in one take though.

The other scene is the one everyone complains about and is the whole reason these two men are seeking revenge. Like Jordan said it lasts quite a long time (about 12 minutes I think) and is where a woman gets raped in an underpass. It's really intense and quite hard to watch but it does make you realise that this sort of thing does happen in real life and how horrible and bad it is for them.

Ok if you skipped that bit you can start reading again now.

Overall it's a great film, not to watch if you don't like nasty stuff or don't mind reading subtitles (as it's a French film) but from a technical and acting standpoint it's amazing.

Definitely worth seeing if you get the chance.

8/10.