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Climax begins with an opening dance number, to a remix of Cerrone’s Supernature, which turns into an incredibly well-choreographed spin around the dance floor for everyone involved, so yeah, sod The Greatest Dancer on BBC1, since this is what you should be watching if that’s what you’re into.
However, after three days of rehearsal, it’s time to chill out and have a few drinks, but someone’s drugged the punch and they’re not feeling very good.
I think this is the first film where I’ve seen all the movie credits placed right at the beginning of the film. Not like one of those films from decades ago where you get a fair selection of credits, leaving just ‘The End’ to come at the end, but I mean by absolutely bombarding you with text, all of which is fairly scrunched up together… then again, some credits also come along around 45 minutes in. Yes, Gaspar Noé doesn’t do things in a conventional manner.
However, it’s only from around that point that we begin to get into the meat of the story, as they’re all getting too far gone for their own good, since Noé happily allows them to stand around for 30 minutes chatting about the inconsequential things in life, and that part is not in the least bit interesting, so that’s a large section you can easily skip.
From that point, however, it does slowly get more interesting – which is certainly a comment you can’t make about 2015’s Love 3D. That said, it also gets very disturbing, since they’re all so high that one character is urged to kill themselves by the others, and it all involves a lot of random primal screaming by almost everyone as they struggle to come down from their high.
One of the best things about this film is that it includes the track Windowlicker by Aphex Twin. However, you can listen to that quite easily without sitting through 70 minutes of this until it is played.
If you’re a fan of the writer/director’s work, then you’ll no doubt really enjoy this. If you’re not, then he really doesn’t care. When he learned that 7 people walked out of his film at an 8.30am Cannes screening, he said that was a good figure, because it’s normally more like 25% of the audience.
Personally, I always stick with a film until it has finished, and I agree with Mark Kermode that you can’t review a film if you haven’t seen it all, but sometimes… just sometimes… it’s almost as painful as coming off that LSD trip.
On the plus side, dispensing with all the credits much earlier means that when the film ends, that IS the end, so you’re not going to get the likes of Vue and Odeon whacking the lights up to nuclear-blast levels when you’re trying to watch them.
Climax is out now on Blu-ray, DVD and you can also buy the CD soundtrack.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 97 minutes
Studio: Arrow Video
Year: 2019
Format: 2.35:1 (ARRIRAW (3.4K))
Language: French, with some English
Released: February 11th 2019
Film: 3/10
Director: Gaspar Noé
Producers: Brahim Chioua, Richard Grandpierre, Vincent Maraval and Edouard Weil
Screenplay: Gaspar Noé
Cinematography: Benoît Debie
Cast:
Selva: Sofia Boutella
David: Romain Guillermic
Lou: Souheila Yacoub
Daddy: Kiddy Smile
Emmanuelle: Claude Gajan Maull
Gazelle: Giselle Palmer
Taylor: Taylor Kastle
Psyche: Thea Carla Schott
Ivana: Sharleen Temple
Lea: Lea Vlamos
Alaya: Alaia Alsafir
Rocket: Kendall Mugler
Riley: Lakdhar Dridi
Omar: Adrien Sissoko
Bats: Mamadou Bathily
Alou: Alou Sidibé
Ashley: Ashley Biscette
Mounia: Mounia Nassangar
Sila: Tiphanie Au
Sara: Sarah Belala
Cyborg: Alexandre Moreau
Naab: Naab
Strauss: Strauss Serpent
Tito: Vince Galliot Cumant
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.