FILM · 2018 · FRANCE
Climax
29 archived facts 5 topics 1 source Last reviewed Oct 2026
29 Interesting Facts About Climax
Interesting Facts (22)
- #001
The second half of Climax consists almost entirely of a single unbroken 42-minute take.
- #002
Climax was shot from a 5-page script.
- #003
The first ten minutes of Climax, an opening scene made up entirely of one continuous take, took 15 to 16 takes to shoot.
- #004
The scenes in Climax were shot in chronological order.
- #005
The title sequence at the end of Climax appears two minutes into the film. The main credits also appear 45 minutes into the film, and the film's title appears in the final 8 seconds.
- #006
Of all the dance scenes in Climax, only the first was choreographed; the rest were the result of the dancers expressing themselves in their own language.
- #007
Gaspar Noé says he wanted so much to make a psychological drama that was the opposite of Stanley Kubrick's 2001 that Climax resembles people turning back into monkeys, returning to their original powers, rather than monkeys turning into humans.
- #008
Climax is one of Gaspar Noé's best-reviewed films; as he himself admits, this left him somewhat doubtful, since he believes that art in general, and his films in particular, should be divisive and unsettle the audience.
- #009
For the dance scenes, Gaspar Noé tried to push his protagonists to summon states of possession similar to those encountered in ritual trances.
- #010
According to Gaspar Noé, the first part of Climax is like a rollercoaster and the second like a ghost train.
- #011
Gaspar Noé stated that, in contrast to the film's content, the making of Climax was the most peaceful production he had worked on to date. There were no arguments off set and no alcohol or drug use.
- #012
According to Gaspar Noé, "Angie" by The Rolling Stones was used at the end of the film because he wanted something emotional and famous to play at the end. The Eagles' "Hotel California" and other songs by David Bowie and Lou Reed were also considered.
- #013
Climax was partly inspired by a 1990s French urban legend. Gaspar Noé and several other crew members claim they remember reading about similar incidents in the news, though none of them remembers a specific detail.
- #014
On the poster for Climax, the cast members lie scattered around a room on the floor or on chairs. Most of these characters are actually in the positions they occupy at the end of the film; they have been superimposed so that they appear to all be in the same room.
- #015
In the final pose of the opening choreography, the dancers spell out "ACID".
- #016
According to Gaspar Noé, the film is about a safe place turning into an asylum.
- #017
According to Sofia Boutella, the scenes required four hours of rehearsal and each took more than 13 takes.
- #018
Although the title card "Birth is a unique experience" stays on screen for a few seconds, there are two additional title cards that appear almost subliminally, one in the opening title sequence and one near the end of the film. They read "Life is a collective impossibility" and "Death is an extraordinary experience."
- #019
According to Gaspar Noé, sangria was always what he used to get his classmates drunk in his childhood.
- #020
In a 2018 interview about the film, director Gaspar Noé was quoted as saying: "Today even the representation of male or female nudity is demonized. Western societies are moving in many ways toward the 19th century or toward more repressive cultures with religious origins." Noé added that he found this trend paradoxical given the increasingly positive acceptance of LGBT+ identities. "It's much easier for people to be gay, bisexual or multi-gender or whatever, people have more sexual freedom now. But the representation of sexuality is becoming problematic."
- #021
The long takes were inspired by Victoria (2015), a 134-minute film shot in a single take.
- #022
In the opening few minutes of the film, interviews are shot from the image of a television screen with books on the left and horror VHS tapes on the right. Suspiria is one of the horror tapes, and it concerns a dance company, creating parallels with Climax.
Behind the Scenes (1)
- #023
The opening and closing scenes in the snow were entirely accidental and improvised. It snowed for two days during the shoot in the small suburb where the crew was filming. Gaspar then suggested flying a drone over a local park.
Characters & Cast (1)
- #024
Gaspar Noé put the cast into the mindset of dissociative drug psychosis by assembling a collection of the best videos he could find on the web of crack, high-dose ecstasy and high-level acid addicts. The dancers were also encouraged to take the experiential aspects the videos brought to mind and run with them in the film.
Easter Eggs & References (4)
- #025
Apart from Sofia Boutella, the only professional actor in the cast, the ensemble is made up of professional dancers with no previous acting experience. Although Boutella had the dance experience the role required, she hesitated to join the film because there was no script. Director Gaspar Noé encouraged the cast to improvise extensively; the only restriction was that, since the story is set in the 1990s, they could not reference contemporary things such as smartphones.
- #026
In the sequence where we see 'select cassettes' on a TV screen, the frame also contains various books and VHS covers that hint at Gaspar Noé's inspirations: titles referencing Luis Buñuel, Dario Argento and the Romanian philosopher Emil Cioran, famous for his extremely negative views on life and humanity.
- #027
It is the first Gaspar Noé film to receive an R rating from the MPAA. All of his previous films were rated NC-17 or were unrated. When he questioned this, he was told it was due to the absence of genitalia.
- #028
The scene in which Sofia Boutella's character does a somersault and tears down the window curtains is a direct reference to Andrzej Zulawski's 1981 classic Possession, in which Isabelle Adjani's character goes mad in a very similar way while carrying food in the subway.
Deeper Meaning (1)
- #029
Some of the psychotic scenes choreographed in Possession (1981) served as inspiration for certain scenes in Climax.
Sources & editorial notes
Reference databases
- IMDb
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