Viraj's Weblog

This is a polarizing movie that you either love or hate. I tend to like it very much. It's long and drawn out, trippy in every sense, and will likely make you nauseous. The opening credits make it apparent that those prone to seizures should avoid watching. Much of the movie is filmed from behind someone's head, as if a camera is mounted there. One of Gaspar Noe's previous movies is Irreversible. That movie takes voyeurism to an extreme, and is widely known for a very long and difficult to watch rape scene. One thing about his movies is they are powerful and shocking. Enter the Void is no different. What better way to take voyeurism to another extreme by following someone after he dies.

The movie is set in seedy Japan, and the look is as irreligious as you can imagine. Japan is a world of stimulation and onslaught towards your senses. It's a world that is filled with so much color and neon lights that it looks almost fake. This movie blends a clearly fake set with reality, and sometimes you can't tell the difference. That's really how Japan is! The cinematography is just amazing. The camera flies through the sky and buildings to build up its story. It's a cartoon world with real people and real problems. It is portrays well what Japan looks like to a foreigner, especially the isolation between foreigners and society. But what is this movie about? IMDB's plotline is:

A drug-dealing teen is killed in Japan, after which he reappears as a ghost to watch over his sister.

Ok. Think of it as 2.5 hours of this minus the puking. There are various hints at the beginning of the movie as to what the rest of the movie is going to be about. I will spoil it because I doubt anyone reading this will actually watch the movie: it's about death and reincarnation. There is a dialogue at the beginning about the Tibetan Book of the Dead and 2 people talking about reincarnation. That sets the stage for everything else in the movie. The main character dies quite early. But he has a bond with his sister, and its told through flashbacks. The death of their parents is the one strong foothold in the movie, and it grabs you from the dreamy nature of the rest of the movie.

There is an amazing scene at the end that is a very interesting take on what things must be like just before reincarnation. The camera (and ghost) fly in and out of a Love Hotel. Of course, lots of sex is going on. You think, "wow such depravity". But what's unique is each sexual act gets a almost holy aura to it. It's as if each couple is a gateway into the real world and out of the ghost world. The flying soul chooses one couple to make his entrance. It may be an unwise choice if it ends in abortion. Otherwise, a new life is born. But what's one of the first thing that child experiences? The pain of getting his umbilical cord cut. All life is suffering.