Most walked out disgusted, some repulsed by what they were seeing. There was one person to blame for this: Gaspar Noé, the director, who had previously tortured audiences with his shocking powerhouse Irreversible (aka Monica Bellucci getting raped by a disgusting gay pimp and getting avenged by Vincent Cassel and friend via fire extinguisher blow to the head to the power of 21, all with nausea- inducing imagery and horrific violence). But don't shoot the messenger: for Gaspar's film was merely acting as a window into the void that is the human experience. I don't know what high level (?) acting some were expecting on this film, it's not like regular individuals have Broadway-levels of expression or emotion on display whenever something happens to them, there are real life dead beats out there. Plus, it's not the acting that takes center stage here, it's the visuals, the seductively nightmarish neon splashes of immorality and fever dream- ish visuals. It's painful and sometimes dull to watch not because it's a badly written piece of cinema, but because it shows us the true nature of human interaction, the black hole that is life (especially if you're an incestuous junkie with nothing better to do than getting high and leading a life of crime, sin, and overall meaninglessness). With this film, you are entering the void, and you may never return from it. An assault on the senses, a masochistic experience, but a very educational one at that. Weirdly enough, this film did not make me into an edgy nihilist, but instead taught me (in its own intense way) to appreciate life more than I did before, and compelled me to make the most of it. Definitely not a film for the faint of heart, the easily offended, or the snobbish progressive that can't comprehend that debauchery and moral relativism do not equal happiness, fulfillment, or meaning (they can't stand licentiousness being cast in a negative light, and will promptly jump to condemn the film for being too "judgemental" and "self-righteous", as if indulging in selfish hedonism without any moral guidance wasn't a bad thing in and of itself).

Directed by Gaspar Noé, Enter the Void (2009 movie) is "the psychological story of a soul, observing the repercussions of his death, seeks resurrection."—Which is one of the weirdest reasons why this film is always at the top of my weird movie lists. It's one of a kind—a strange and tragic story! Nevertheless, it's one hell of a picture in motion. It is loud, garish, ugly and staggeringly empty. If your idea of visionary filmmaking is someone flashing brightly coloured lights at you, then count yourself in for a treat; you are about to experience some visionary filmmaking. The rest of us will get a repetitive shuffling of unpleasant individuals doing unpleasant things, inter-cut with lots of neon and occasionally a towering penis shoved in our faces (Thank God it wasn't shot in 3D). I don't care how amazing of a technical experience this is. Not only does the emperor have no clothes. He's tea-bagging your wife.Worth watching? Just that one time for a lot of you, probably (if not surely). It's not the greatest film ever made, possibly one of the most memorable cinema experiences in terms of effects, it's overlong, uncomfortable, and excessive, but of course, it's worth viewing as there aren't many movies like it. I'm not epileptic, but I do suffer (even though I hate using that word in this context) from hypnotic (sleep paralysis.) If my understanding is correct, this movie is centred (loosely) around DXM, which triggers lucid dreams. I feel like, because of that, it can get really relocatable for some us. It's not a horror movie, and can't possibly worry about being "scared," per say, I just know it's incredibly real and explicit, and don't want it to keep me awake at night because I can't get the images out of my head.This psychedelic tour of life after death is seen entirely from the point of view of Oscar (Nathaniel Brown), a young American drug dealer and addict living in Tokyo with his prostitute sister, Linda (Paz De La Huerta). When Oscar is killed by police during a bust gone bad, his spirit journeys from the past—where he sees his parents before their deaths—to the present—where he witnesses his own autopsy—and then to the future, where he looks out for his sister from beyond the grave.Overall, it is, in its way, just as provocative, just as extreme, just as mad, just as much of an outrageous ordeal: it arrives here slightly re-edited from the version first shown at Cannes. But despite its querulous melodrama and crazed Freudian pedantry's, it has a human purpose and its sheer deranged brilliance is magnificent. This is a grandiose hallucinatory journey into, and out of, hell: drugged, neon-lit and with a fully realised nightmare-porn aesthetic that has to be seen to be believed. Love him or loathe him – and I've done both in my time – Gaspar Noé (director) is one of the very few directors who is actually trying to do something new with the medium, battling at the boundaries of the possible. It has obvious debts, but "Enter the Void" is utterly original film-making, and Noé is a virtuoso of camera movement.

An interesting, ambitious and provocative project for an experimental filmmaker, but by the midpoint, I was exhausted by it. In sections, it's very fascinating, including the opening scene (first person POV), the montage of the past flashing before his eyes and the final scene depicting a POV of the conception of a baby (graphic sexuality). But in long sections, it's absolutely grating on your patience with horrible dialogue and even worse acting. I mean, really bad.. just monotone dreck. If this kind of slow, abstract filmmaking is for you, I guarantee you that this is your kind of movie. If not, stay very clear.

Turn off the lights, lock your eyes on the screen and be dazed. This brutally honest visualization of life will burn itself into your head. Gaspar Noé has made a movie like no other i have seen before. The closest comparison may be "2001: A Space Odyssey", yet incredibly this movie even transcends Kubricks nauseating travel through space and time. "Enter the Void" has not a single traditional shot, but slowly floats through life and death of the main protagonist, flashing at you its neon lights and taking you through grimy streets. It is, as the movie proclaims itself, "the greatest trip of all", and leaves drug-filled Tokyo as flickering backdrop, while exposing the viewer to every harsh, brutal, sexual, desperate, panicked, euphoric and dirty facet of life. There is no hiding from the imagery presented, no pretending, no being above it. As foreign and shocking as the life shown may be to you, it is entirely human, entirely real. What aspects you will take away from this experience i can not tell you, but there are many moments to ponder, many traumas to relate to. Ultimately, what ties "Enter the Void" to movies you have seen before, is the overarching idea of life and death. The human spirit transcending any individual life. A message tackled before, but never before delivered so shockingly honest."Enter the Void" is a great, great work of art. Be open to experience something uncomfortable, shocking and unfamiliar, and you'll be rewarded with a life lesson you will never forget.