De(con)structive time : visual style and temporal simultaneity in the works of Gaspar Noe?ü.

Abstract

Despite the popularity of director Gaspar Noe?ü's films, little critical attention has been give to the overall style or common themes within his work as a whole, which also includes short films and music videos. Instead most examinations focus on the controversial issues of explicit representations of sex and violence within his feature films. By examining a cross-section of some of Noe?ü's lesser know works such as his music videos and short films, one can find within them representations of his dominant visual style including kinetic camera movements and quickly-paced editing existing alongside extremely long static takes. Such a contrasting visual style suggests Noe?ü's preoccupation with time, and an examination of his two latest feature films, Irr?îversible and Enter the Void, reveal Noe?ü's unique filmic approach to representations of time. Within Irre?üversible, Noe?ü creates the effect of temporal simultaneity--of past, present, and future existing at once--through an intricately structured plot that engages and employs the spectator's memory more intensely than the typical narrative film. In Enter the Void this same concurrence of time is achieved through the subjective point-of-view shots of its protagonist, Oscar. The extended pov sequences position both Oscar and the spectator within the same perspectives in which to view his past, present, in a simultaneous fashion. Noe?ü's preoccupation with creating the effect of immediacy within his films as well as his heavy use of CGI effects places the director squarely within an ever-growing tendency with mainstream films to create a more virtual experience for the spectator. From 3-D movies, high frame rates, surround sound, IMAX experiences, and digital "realism," such attempts at manufactured authenticity coupled with explicit representations of violence introduces new concerns within the debate of the correlation between popular media and violence within society.