Following up last year’s back-to-back U.S. releases of Lux Æterna and Vortex, Gaspar Noé returns this year but not with a new film, technically speaking. Twenty years after the premiere of his harrowing shocker Irreversible, the filmmaker is back with Irreversible: Straight Cut, which re-reverses the film, starring Monica Bellucci and Vincent Cassel, so that it now plays in chronological order. Distributor Altered Innocence will give this new cut a U.S. release beginning February 10th in Los Angeles at Landmark’s Nuart Theatre and New York City at IFC Center, along with additional cities. A restored version of the original film will also play concurrently in select cities, with some featuring a new 35mm print.
Noé said, “Until now, IRREVERSIBLE was a deliberate puzzle. Presented clockwise, everything is clear, and also darker, making it easier to identify with the characters and understand the tale unfolding. The same story is no longer a tragedy, this time it is a drama that brings out the psychology of the characters and the mechanisms that lead some of them to a murderous barbarity. While IRREVERSIBLE has sometimes been wrongly perceived as a ‘rape and revenge’ B movie, here the deadly outcome is all the more depressing. IRREVERSIBLE: STRAIGHT CUT can be more easily seen as a fable on the contagion of barbarity and the command of the reptilian brain over the rational mind. This new cut is another film. You will see. Time reveals all things.”
See the trailer below.
Irreversible: Straight Cut begins its run on Feb. 10 in Los Angeles (Landmark’s Nuart Theatre), New York City (IFC Center), and expand to Philadelphia on Feb. 14, Denver on Feb. 17, San Francisco, Chicago, Austin, and Raleigh on Feb. 24, and Atlanta on March 17.