Irreversible

Gaspar Noe tells one terrible Paris night in reverse, so the vengeance arrives before the wound it answers and every scene plays as dread instead of payoff. The opening reels swim past on a camera that will not sit still, over a soundtrack pitched with a low hum reportedly tuned to unsettle the gut, and two sequences in particular have been emptying festival seats since 2002. Monica Bellucci and Vincent Cassel, married at the time, anchor the tenderness the structure saves for last. The film's motto, le temps detruit tout, time destroys everything, reads as either a thesis or a taunt, and Noe never tells you which.