In his continued crusade against people with epilepsy, the auteur filmmaker that is Gaspar Noé is back with a new film that also happens to be an old film. Lux Æterna is a work that was once thought to be lost to time after first premiering at the Cannes Film Festival back in 2019. It subsequently got a release in France though it wasn’t clear when American audiences would be able to see it for themselves in theaters. That time has now come as it is finally getting a wide release beginning this week. It also comes right on the heels of Noé’s other film, Vortex, which it shares a similar split-screen presentation style with. However, that is pretty much where the similarities end as Lux Æterna becomes a macabre work of metafiction that endlessly pokes fun at itself as it descends further into chaos with each passing shot. Of course, such a descent is to be expected from the director of films like Enter The Void and Climax. What makes this newest film different is that it is also rather funny.

While there have been moments of dark jokes in his prior work, humor is not something that one would typically expect to be central to the experience of a Noé film. Usually, it is quite the opposite. If you ever want a surefire way to completely suck all the mirth out of the room, you could just describe what his film Irreversible is about. If you want to make someone never want to laugh again, you could actually show it to them. While you can sense a similar cruelty that builds to a crescendo in Lux Æterna, there also is the unshakeable feeling that the film is having a go at itself and filmmaking in general.

Central to this is Béatrice Dalle and Charlotte Gainsbourg playing versions of themselves as they share a semi-drunken opening conversation by the fire. They discuss both witches and their often negative stories on film sets. This is interesting as neither is a stranger to rather intense films which, as you follow their musings, it sounds like they could be describing stories from. Dalle herself was a terrifying force of violence in the pinnacle of French Extremism that is Inside. With Gainsbourg, films like Antichrist or Nymphomaniac come to mind. Both speak with wry wisdom from being involved in enough productions to know what they’re really like.

lux aeterna trailer

Image via Yellow Veil Pictures

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Following this conversation, the film pulls back to reveal that the duo is actually on such a film set right now. It shifts into being a journey through all the various aspects of the production that become increasingly unhinged. Conversations overlap, people shout at each other, and everything is filtered through the various egos of everyone trying to regain control. Noé deploys a variety of techniques to achieve this cinematic anarchy from repeated split screens to the unrelenting flashing of multicolored lights mixed with a droning sound that may make you want to cover your eyes and ears. Much of this will be familiar to those who follow his work and the film takes on a further meta quality as it feels like this is where Noé was trying out an approach that he would more fully implement in the aforementioned Vortex.

Lux Æterna is both more restrained, running for 52 minutes that feels like it is much longer, while also being more expansive in its aspirations about art. The amount of back-and-forth bickering is deeply silly, showing how quick to anger everyone on set can be at even the smallest thing. When things actually start to go wrong through a series of technical glitches that just seem impossible to fix, well that really will set everyone off until the order is lost completely.

The fact that this film was essentially first conceived of as an ill-fated ad for Yves Saint Laurent makes it all the funnier as there is no way to discern that if you didn’t know ahead of time. Any brief asides where people try on designer clothes or handbags feel like just another vapid aspect of the tumultuous production that masks a more illuminating reality. While we tend to romanticize the process of filmmaking and imagine it as being a well-oiled machine of creative synergy, that is very much not the case.

lux-aeterna
Image via Yellow Veil Pictures

The multitude of ways people are shown undercutting each other and angling for control on set is Noé’s way of stripping away this premise to show it is often just a total mess. There are even humorous, almost sarcastic interjections of quotes from famous directors that feel downright silly when shown alongside the characters slowly losing control. From the man just shouting increasing nonsense into a bullhorn to the glorious wailing of Dalle in the back of the room, it all makes clear how bizarre making a movie is. There even is the presence of actor Karl Glusman who appeared in Noé’s 2016 film Love and seems to be playing himself here as well. He is constantly trying to get Charlotte’s attention to get her to be in his film which, when he describes it, sounds an awful lot like what we are watching. It could be called a mockumentary, though there is a righteous undercurrent that feels more full of rage and anger to just reduce it to such a superficial label.

This all has and could be dismissed as being contemptuous to the craft, though it ends up still feeling playful enough to make clear that it isn’t taking itself entirely seriously. A great moment comes when an extra, Abbey Lee also playing a version of herself, says she can’t even understand what is going on with everyone yelling. It is all a gag, a pillorying of pretentiousness that finds kinetic energy and enthusiasm for the form that it is also setting out to deconstruct. It is more silly than anything the director has done, skewering himself and the film industry at every opportunity with a wink.

Even as Noé is clearly having a laugh at his own process, there is never any moment that feels like he is compromising on how distinct and strange of a visionary he remains. It isn’t his best film by any means though there is an undeniable sense of spectacle and intensity that never gets lost. There is even an underlying tension about how film, both in this production and broadly, can soon shift into being exploitative towards those making it. It just also happens to be wrapped in the embrace of an increasingly ludicrous series of escalations. Yes, this means ending with 10 minutes straight of flashing lights that will make even the most stoic of viewers have to avert their eyes. Through it all, you can’t help but chuckle at its enduring audacity and absurdity. Even as it isn't fully realized in everything it goes for, the tonal and visual head trip alone makes it worthwhile.