This French film featured in the 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die book, I can definitely agree with that, because alongside such listed films as A Clockwork Orange and Eraserhead, this is one of those films that is really disturbing, but has to be seen. Basically this tells the story of a night out for a couple, but in a Memento style (not backwards and forwards until meeting in the middle, just backwards) this shows it in reverse chronological order. So the opening scene is the body of an assaulted man taken out on a stretcher from the gay club called The Rectum, this scene in regular order would be the ending. Then it flashes back to two men trying to find the club, looking for a man called Le Tenia (Jo Prestia),and when he is eventually found, after getting through people who don't answer and just want sexual acts, and the man wanting him starts a fight, but he ends up with his head smashed in by a fire extinguisher. It flashes back again with the two men, named Pierre (Albert Dupontel) and Marcus (Black Swan's Vincent Cassel),asking some prostitutes who knows where to find Guillermo Nunez, and talking to male transvestite Concha (Jara-Millo),and after getting beaten he says to go to The Rectum. Flashing back again to when Pierre and Marcus are leaving a party, they notice a body on a stretcher being wheeled out from the subway tunnel, and Marcus identifies the savagely beaten body as his girlfriend Alex (Monica Bellucci),and when asked by a man if he wants revenge he says yes, and they start the journey to find the guilty party. Another flash and we see what happened to Alex, she was with Marcus and Pierre at the party socialising with friends, after some drug taking and inappropriate behaviour from the boys she leaves and takes the route down the tunnel, and she passes La Tenia threatening a prostitute with a knife, and he lets her go to viciously rape and beat her for nine minutes. Flashing back more Alex, Marcus and Pierre arrive to go to the party, and we find out that Pierre was originally her boyfriend, but it is now Marcus, and there does not seem to be any bad feeling between them. Flashing before the party starts at all, Marcus and Alex lie in bed together, and they get a phone call from Pierre telling them they will have to take the subway as his car is broke down, and she also finds out that she is pregnant with Marcus's baby. The final flashback sees Alex happy and minding her own business in a park reading a book and watching children play, unaware of her fate to come, and the last words on screen are "time destroys all things". This is a really powerful film because it has some of the most daringly and extremely violent and distressing scenes, the beating to death with a fire extinguisher and of course the horrible rape scene are definitely the ones that stand out. Of course if the film was in the correct chronological order the disturbing sequences would obviously be towards the end, it is much more significant to see them towards the beginning, and this makes for an overall controversial, uncomfortable and distressing film, but equally a masterpiece drama. Very good!

The movie is in reverse chronology. Alex (Monica Bellucci) and Marcus (Vincent Cassel) are a couple. They go to a party with their friend Pierre (Albert Dupontel). Alex leaves alone and is brutally raped. Marcus and Pierre find transvestite Concha who identifies Le Tenia as the rapist. They go to a gay club to find him but they kill the wrong man.

Watching it as intended is almost a waste of time. The first half is so chaotic with extremely violent hand-held camera moves. It is almost incomprehensible. In the middle section, there is a long uncut rape scene. The last section clarifies the movie but it doesn't really have any drama. Even the reveal can't fully save this. It's an experiment that doesn't work. As for the main controversy, the rape scene is quite vicious. It's shock cinema but I don't dismiss the movie for that. My main problems are the reverse chronology and the chaotic camera moves at the beginning.

I have been watching movies for decades, and as far as I remember, only three movies have disturbed me. The first one was `Soldier Blue', when I was a teenager, explicitly showing the massacre of the American Indians. Later, in 1982, `Sophie's Choice', when a mother has to decide which son shall remain alive. `Irreversible', which I saw yesterday, was the third one. The storyline is very simple: In Paris, a young couple goes to a party with a friend by subway. They discuss, and the woman decides to return back home alone. She is violently raped in an underground passage. Her husband and her friend decide to make justice by themselves. What makes the difference in this polemic movie? First of all, like in `Memento', the story is presented backwards, in a reverse chronology, from the credits to the beginning. Although not being original, unfolded this way, the story shocks much more. Then, the cruelty of at least two very explicit scenes (the rape of Alexandra and the aggression and crime of Pierre in the gay night-club) are amazingly well choreographed and real. The beginning of the film, with the camera spinning randomly, and a weird soundtrack, makes the viewer sick and so disoriented and disturbed as Marcus, the character of Vincent Cassel. Therefore, technically this film is outstanding. The performance of the cast and the direction, photography and soundtrack are stunning. Living in Rio de Janeiro, a violent city, the story is very real and scary, and that is why it shakes up more than a horror movie. We never believe that this situation may happen to ourselves or to our friends, but the daily newspaper shows many similar examples. The idea of the irreversibility of time and its destruction, the same way of the lives of the characters in this movie, is fantastic. Certainly a very sensitive person will be sick and will not like this movie. The box of the DVD should advise that this story is recommended to a specific audience. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): `Irreversível' (`Irreversible')