Original, uncut version of Gaspar Noe’s Critically Acclaimed Hit ENTER THE VOID To Be Released In Theaters.
New York, NY (January 12, 2011) – IFC Films announced today that the company is releasing the original, uncut version of Gaspar Noe’s ENTER THE VOID in New York and Los Angeles. The new cut includes 20 minutes of footage never before seen in American theaters-although it was this longer version that was released theatrically in France, to great acclaim. VOID first opened in New York on September 24th, 2010 at the IFC Center and still continues to play to packed theaters as it enters into the fifth month of its run, making it one of the top grossing films in IFC Center history. Gaspar Noe’s provocative drama has proven to be one of the most talked about films of the year, appearing on numerous top-ten lists, including lists by filmmakers such as Edgar Wright, John Waters, and Quentin Tarantino who have all named it one of the best films of 2010. Tarantino comments about VOID, "Hands down best credit scene of the year… Maybe best credit scene of the decade. One of the greatest in cinema history."
Oscar (Nathaniel Brown) and his sister Linda (Paz de la Huerta) are recent arrivals in Tokyo. Oscar’s a small time drug dealer, and Linda works as a nightclub stripper. One night, Oscar is caught up in a police bust and shot. As he lies dying, his spirit, faithful to the promise he made his sister that he would never abandon her, refuses to leave the world of the living. It wanders through the city, in visions growing evermore distorted, evermore nightmarish. Past, present and future merge in a hallucinatory maelstrom.
Required to deliver a shorter version of ENTER THE VOID for international sale, Noe decided to excise an entire reel from his original cut, skipping over part of Oscar’s transition into the spirit world. In the restored footage "Oscar wakes up in the morgue and he thinks he’s alive but he’s dead," Noe explains, "and his sister, his friends say, "No, man, you’re not you, you’re not Oscar. You’re a zombie." He looks in the mirror and sees the face of his father instead of his own face and Alex says, "No, c’mon, man. You never came back to life. You’re dead, you’ve been cremated. You’re just dreaming that you’re alive. And then we go to that astral vision where he comes out from that urn where his ashes are inside his sister’s apartment and she throws his ashes into the sink and the camera gets into the sink. And that’s where we see some weird kind of insects…" Noe adds, "Actually, when I proposed that solution to the producers, they told me they thought it was never going to work."
The French Theatrical ENTER THE VOID will be playing the IFC Center January 14th through January 20th with daily showtimes at 3:10pm and 8:40pm and an additional Friday and Saturday showing at 11:45pm. The film will also be playing an engagement at The Landmark Nuart Theater in Los Angeles on January 21st for a special midnight showing. This will be the last chance to see ENTER THE VOID in theaters before the DVD release on January 26th by MPI Home Video.
About IFC FILMS
Established a decade ago, IFC Films – a division of Rainbow Media’s IFC Entertainment – is the leading U.S. distributor of independent and foreign film. Its unique day and date distribution model makes independent films available to a national audience by releasing them simultaneously in theaters as well as on cable’s On Demand platform and through Pay-Per-View, reaching nearly 50 million homes. IFC Films’ "IFC Midnight" label, launched in 2010, offers the very best in international genre cinema, including horror, sci-fi, thrillers, erotic arthouse, action and more. Some of the company’s successes over the years have included My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Y Tu Mama Tambien, Touching the Void, Me and You and Everyone We Know, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, Gomorrah, Che, Summer Hours, In the Loop, Antichrist, The Human Centipede, Cairo Time, Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work, and Wordplay. IFC Films has worked with established and breakout auteurs, including Steven Soderbergh, Gus Van Sant, Spike Lee, Richard Linklater, Miranda July, Lars Von Trier, Gaspar Noe, Todd Solondz, Cristian Mungiu, Susanne Bier, Olivier Assayas, Jim McKay, Larry Fessenden, Gregg Araki, Jacques Rivette, Claude Chabrol, as well as more recent breakouts such as Andrea Arnold, Mia Hansen Love, Corneliu Porombiou, Joe Swanberg, Barry Jenkins, Lena Dunham, Aaron Katz, Daryl Wein and Abdellatif Kechiche.