unfair to psychedelics, unfair to death, unfair to sexuality....
When I first saw this movie, I was blown away, most likely because of the effects that were being used -- the editing, the absolutely masterful sound design (which i will give kudos for), the visuals and the pacing, the shocking elements, the sheer immersive quality of its design.
I watched it a couple more times, still appreciating it, but letting my reactions be less emotional and more thoughtful. The more I did this, the more I began to question if there's some truly sick messages within the film that have disguised themselves with powerful stylistic effects and psychological suggestion.
Its been a a little over a year since I first saw the film, and a lot has happened in this past year that has helped me deeper understand the nature of Fear. Now i am convinced that this is a reproachably unhealthy film, despite its masterful production.
First off, the deep misunderstanding of the psychedelic experience. I suppose this is what happens when you put psychedelics outside the context of nature and in an urban hell, attached to crime and escapism. DMT is a blessed secret of nature that holds keys to infinite beauty, however the film never balanced its presented experience with this truth, rather it connected the psychedelic experience completely to death and trauma, and a false form of death.
Death is a fundamental part of all life and transformation, cells of one's body and neurons in one's brain are dying rapidly at every moment. Death is a part of your living system, and the ultimate perishing of your living system is part of a greater living system. This process is why you get to feel any pleasure or life or love whatsoever. There's deep pleasure within the truth of death.
the "death" that Gaspar Noe is attempting to share secrets about is not death at all: it is FEAR. The entire fantasy of Enter the Void is a weapon of fear that attacks its viewers with assaulting stimuli, a fantasy that embeds misconceptions about the nature of death into those who make the error of surrendering their emotions to this film experience. The idea that your spirit will remain individuated and attached to your grievers is completely false and unnatural, and reinforces our collective psyche's current and historical sickness that is the paralyzing anxiety of dying and the misunderstanding of its role in nature.
Enter the Void streams this lie about death into the fear of psychedelics -- which, I can't speak for france, but in the US there is still a widespread fear about the issue, youth and oldtimers alike. This film, so advertised as a psychedelic visionary experience, actually instead expands the notion that these molecules are demonic and are associated with that which steals life. People fear for their loved ones who choose to consult the psychedelics that they might go too far and not come back; this is a possessive and unreasonable fear that is unsupportive to those who choose such a path. And its this fear that the film confirms rather than attempts to dissolve, by suspending it deep inside what we know as "trauma".
Trauma is unfortunately in the world. People have traumatic experiences, some worse than others. I've had experiences that could be considered traumatic. Anybody who has had to recover from trauma, or knows how to take care of a trauma victim knows that REVISITING AND EXPANDING THE TRAUMATIC MEMORY WORSENS IT!!!!! So why would anyone wish to display trauma, as Noe and his crew have, as being the ultimate reality? And worse, why the *beep* would you position something as powerful as the psychedelic experience among this traumatic effect, relating the two, which anyone who works with these molecules knows how DANGEROUS such an association is? This positioning is the sort of thing that increases likelihood of misunderstood and thus traumatic psychedelic trips by misleading participants about what the molecule is doing to them. Doesn't Noe understand how important it is that we must collectively understand these molecules as medicines that are key to a sane human society and must be decriminalized? Why the hell would he play into the fear-mongers' hands?
The artifice of the film, the stylism that shrouds these deeply hurtful messages, uses hypnotic effects that debilitates one's proper perception of what they're experiencing. Strobing, quick cut editing, shock effect in sound dynamics -- these things have reported to show that they seize the disconnection of the right and left hemispheres of the brain and inhibits their synthesis, a seizing which erodes intuition, interpretation, the grounding of the imagination, the connection with the physical self, everything that a balanced brain is responsible for. They're mickey mouse magic tricks that once blinded me into feeling Enter the Void was the best film I've ever seen. It's all an illusion, folks.
As for sexuality, there's another thread on here that runs pretty long about the film's homophobia. However it's not just homosexuality that the film is unfair too, but all sexuality. All sex depicted in this film is basically inorganic and disgusting, the kind of "lower function" that Christian and Freudian intellect has attempted to program into the collective "educated" psyche. I could go on, but really its the same lies about sex that are being told about psychedelics and death as well, and I've all ready gone over them.
Everything about this film is a lie and a trick and its agenda is fear. The death it presents is nothing but a deeply perverted illusion. I would suggest not supporting it.