Rent Climax (2018)

It's a Gaspar Noe film. - Climax review by RW

Who hasn't been to a party where the punch has been spiked with acid and everything has descended into a hellish nightmare? If you are familiar with Noe's back catalogue and liked them you should like this. Slightly looser than his previous work and improvisation heavily used but still very stylised and choreographed with a great soundtrack to boot.

A film of two halves - Climax review by LC

This is a difficult film to rate - I found the first half pretty enjoyable viewing, but the second half mostly lost me. Nothing much happens in the first half (other than some wild dancing), but there are lots of inventive camera moves, long takes, colour and sound, and I found it interesting in an 'arty' way. For the second half of the film, things shift more into horror mode as the spiked drink kicks in, but I couldn't really buy into the reality of the situation, and endless scenes of people wandering around screaming hysterically ultimately felt slightly boring. Despite that, there's enough visual invention here that I'd say this is still worth a watch if you appreciate more off-beat and arty films, it's just a shame the largely improvised narrative isn't stronger. (3.5 out of 5)

Excruciatingly dull dance-hall film - Climax review by Alphaville

This is a film about a troupe of young “dancers” cavorting around a dance hall to disco music. There’s a lot of hands-in-the-air arm-waving. Someone spikes the sangria with LSD then there’s a lot of shouting and screaming. It’s an ensemble piece with no interesting characters and no plot. All the action takes place in the one location. It’s like an amateur student drama. Towards the end it’s filmed upside down in red tones. Presumably that’s meant to be a metaphor. It certainly impressed gullible critics at arty film festivals. It’s so ridiculously repetitive and OTT it’ll make you laugh before fast-forwarding to the end or just giving up on it.

The DVD Extras are far more interesting. There’s a discussion of the music used and a feature on director Gaspar Noé’s career, which will make you want to watch his next film even less.