10 Psychedelic Horror Movies That Mess With Your Brain
4. Climax
Written and directed by notorious auteur of French Extremity cinema Gaspar Noé, the filmmaker who brought us the twisted delights of Enter The Void and Irreversible, Climax is a frenzied and sensory-annihilating reason for why not to do drugs.
Describe by the filmmaker as a study of what happens when a community goes wrong, Climax centres around a group of dancers slowly devolve into paranoia and violence when someone spikes their sangria with LSD. Drawing inspiration from David Cronenberg's Shivers and Zulawski's Possession (just some of film's inspirations that can be seen piled next to a TV at the start of the film), Noé wastes no time in establishing his film as a surreal experience by beginning with the end credits as we see a lone survivor hysterically screaming in the snow to Gary Newman's electronic version of Gymnopedies.
From hereon, Climax becomes a rhythmic, hypnotic, and trance-like experience scored by a pounding electronic soundscape. Heightened by Noé's visionary direction and phenomenal choreography, watching Climax is a mind-blowing experience even before the LSD is introduced.
Although Climax is somewhat tamer than the auteur's other works, make no mistake: this is still an incredibly disturbing and difficult film to watch.