Directed by
Gaspar Noé
Writing credits
Gaspar Noé
Irréversible contains thirteen scenes presented in reverse chronological order. The film begins with two men in a small apartment suite. One of them is the "Butcher", the protagonist of Noé's previous film, I Stand Alone. In a drunken monologue, the Butcher reveals that he was arrested for having sex with his daughter. Their philosophical musings shift to the subject of a commotion in the streets outside, which is derisively attributed to the patrons of a nearby homosexual S&M nightclub called The Rectum. Minutes earlier, two men named Marcus and Pierre are escorted out of that nightclub by the police. Marcus is on a stretcher, apparently injured, and Pierre is in handcuffs. Men on the streets shout homophobic insults at them. Earlier that evening, Marcus and Pierre arrived at the club in a frantic search for somebody nicknamed le Tenia — "the Tapeworm". Marcus finds the man believed to be le Tenia and attacks him. The man pins Marcus down, then breaks his arm and attempts to rape him. Pierre rescues Marcus by bludgeoning the attacker's face using a fire extinguisher, fatally crushing the man's skull after repeated blows. Before entering the club, it is learned that Marcus and Pierre went in search of le Tenia after questioning several prostitutes. Apparently their goal is retribution for someone's rape. They track down a transsexual prostitute named Concha who identifies the rapist as le Tenia after Marcus threatens to slash her with a piece of broken glass. Concha also reveals that the rapist is likely to be found at a nightclub called The Rectum. Marcus and Pierre were aided in their search by a street thug named Mourad and his friend Layde. Mourad promised to help them find le Tenia for money so that Marcus could have his revenge, rather than leave the matter to the police. It is revealed that le Tenia anally raped Marcus' girlfriend Alex, and beat her so severely that she fell into a coma. The rape takes place after Alex encounters le Tenia beating Concha in a pedestrian underpass. Le Tenia then turns his attention on Alex and threatens her with a knife to her throat. He then proceeds to rape Alex, pinning her down on her stomach and threatening her. After raping Alex, le Tenia brutally beats her. From this scene, it becomes clear that Pierre and Marcus attack the wrong man later in the story. Le Tenia was in fact standing right next to the man Pierre killed in club Rectum. In the next scene, we see Alex, Marcus, and Pierre at a party. Alex is annoyed by Marcus' unrestrained use of drugs and alcohol and his flirtatious behavior with other women, and consequently decides to leave the party. The next scene shows the trio discussing sex in a metro station and in the train. It is revealed Pierre used to be Alex' lover. The penultimate scene shows Marcus and Alex lying in bed after sex. Alex reveals she might be pregnant, and Marcus is pleased with the possibility. To prepare for the party, Marcus leaves to buy wine and Alex has a shower. Alone, Alex uses a home pregnancy test that confirms she is now carrying a child, for which she is elated. She is shown sitting on the bed clothed, with her hand on her belly. A poster for Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, with the tagline "The Ultimate Trip", is above the headboard. The final colorful scene shows Alex reading An Experiment with Time by John William Dunne in a park, surrounded by playing children. Beethoven's 7th Symphony is heard in the background. The camera spins around faster and faster until it blacks out into a strobe effect, accompanied by a pulsing, roaring sound. A rapidly-spinning image of the cosmos can be dimly perceived. The final title card reads: "Time destroys everything" — a phrase uttered in the film's first scene by one of the men in the apartment.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0290673/
