The Destruction of Beauty
I would like to preface this by thanking TheMan18 for recommending drugoe kino for a part of this forray. A portion of this discussion was briefly had in a few other threads here, but I wanted to condense some thoughts and also add on top of them to hopefully form a clearer picture.
While Gaspar Noé's Irreversible remains a polarizing film, it is difficult to dismiss the director's depiction of a world decoupling from beauty and morality. The film's use of dark and grainy colors coupled with the use of sound not only function to make an unpleasant viewing experience, but symbolically highlight a world distinctly lacking any form of entropic threshold. Through the use of an unconventional narrative, roll shots, sound, and film filter, Noé creates a purposefully chaotic viewing experience.
The sequences with posters for 2001: A Space Odyssey create a stark juxtaposition between Kubrick's world where man is elevated to heavens, and Noé's, where man is relegated to hell. In 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick beautifully highlights the culmination of material triumph and the evolution of man, and while the film has dark and subtle undertones, there remains a lingering note of triumphalism, as we see man reach his fullest potential. Yet Gaspar Noé's Irreversible makes a loud objection to Kubrick's notion, and distinctly portrays man as not some intellectual being capable of rationality, benevolence, and enlightenment, but as animal, no different from the primitive tapir shown in Kubrick's epic.
In a sense, both films mirror one another: one has astronauts floating in space, the other has pedophiles hanging over the floor in chains. Both films highlight a form of man at his meridian. In 2001 we see man reaching the apex of progress, conquering not only the finitude of Earth, but the infinitude of the Universe; in Irreversible, we see man reach the apogee of hedonistic jubilation, as the prostitutes on the street are able to combine with both sexes, evolving into "hermaphrodites."
Historically, much of the film's criticism was directed at this rather primitive portrayal of homosexuality. In Irreversible, homosexuality is depicted as the domain of depraved and unadulterated savagery. With this motif, Noé attempts to illuminate a world completely unhinged, where the only concern is self-indulgence and temporal satiation. In a primitive and functional context, homosexuality is seen as the ultimate form of gratification, as it is pleasure absent responsibility (i.e., child-rearing). La Tenia represents a figure of decay and destruction, and his assault on Alex is not only an affront on beauty, but symbolically highlights the desolation of that which is functional (i.e., Alex's baby as an extension of child-rearing and "life" as a whole).
The rape scene in the tunnel is viscerally gut-wrenching not only because of the horrifying aspect of the act itself, but because it is Alex being scarred. Alex symbolizes beauty in a world that has become saturated with the dark and grainy colors of the film. When she is sodomized, she then becomes part of that decay, instead of being a symbol of contrast. This is accentuated perfectly in the tunnel mise-en-scène:
When Alex initially descends into the tunnel, she is in a white dress, with the tunnel's red exterior acutely contrasting her state of innocence and purity; afterwards, Alex becomes thoroughly bloodied, blending in with the very red tunnels she once stood apart from.
The tunnel scene is so horrifying precisely because it carries a subtext that is far more terrifying than the rape itself—Alex's ruination is an extension of the destruction of good, beauty, and order; leaving the message that man has a long way to go before any form of meaningful enlightenment.