24/05/2002 - The press attack Gaspar Noé for the rape in Irréversible but Monica Bellucci and Vincent Cassel defend their director

«You always want scandal , you create it yourselves ... and now you´ve got it in for us because we´ve created a scandal!» said Vincent Cassel in defence of Irreversible. Monica Bellucci has also defended the film - in which she is brutally sodomized in a filthy subway. It is almost as though Noè filmed this sequence to violate Bellucci's absolute beauty. «The scene has created quite a stir, and that justifies it," said Bellucci. Noé, a short Frenchman with a shaven head and an aggressive manner responded: «This film is not, in itself, a crime, it´s only a film about a crime».
The trio had their work cut out for them defending this seemingly indefensible film, and they were booed by journalists who asked a lot of tough questions. Noè and his stars are behind albeit unknowingly, the cause célèbre of this year's festival. Irréversible is an ambitious film that is shot back to front in grainy "cinema vérité" style that almost makes the spectator seasick. Even the end credits run backwards: clearly the result of a careful and highly expensive study financed by StudioCanal France.
The terrible vendetta is played out in the dark room of a gay club called Rectum and it features an awful lot of very realistic, almost unbearable, sexual violence. Then Monica's attacker is brutally kicked to death by a criminal called The Tapeworm - and guess why ... The party scene before the rape features a bunch of over-privileged examples of jeuness dorée indulging themselves in booze and cocaine. But the film also has a tender love scene between the real-life spouses, Bellucci and Cassel the scene ends with a clear reference to one of Noè's favourite films, Kubrick´s 2001. Noè is not new to controversy and in this film Vincent and Monica are his willing guinea pigs.«We used our relationship as a starting point, but I never thought of this film as an invasion of my privacy», explained Bellucci who alternated French and English. Although she stars in The Matrix - reloaded and Man of War, opposite Bruce Willis, Bellucci says her professional life is in Europe, «I work in Hollywood, but I don´t live in Los Angeles». She will soon be back home to work with Gabriele Muccino.
The rape scene grabbed media attention from the start so Monica graces virtually every magazine cover. «Ok, the scene is fiction, not fact, but it certainly was not pleasant for me. I wouldn´t advise everyone to see this film." Bellucci doesn´t think that scene is the core of the film. «It's about revenge and how some deeds cannot be undone: It´s about life and sex from the point of view of three people who have no sense of direction», said the Città di Castello actress. She enjoyed the scene in the Metro, where she chats with her boyfriend and one of her exes - she liked the way the scene developed: It was an improvised scene, but only up to a certain point. Noè allowed Bellucci to speak in her own accent, but nobody is worried about her accent. On the other hand, they are worried that Irréversible might encourage the reintroduction of the death penalty in France, given the current political climate. Noé called this «absurd» because he disapproves of crimes which go unpunished. He quoted from Ovid´s Metamorphoses: «Time destroys everything»... even the scandal will have blown over by tomorrow.