The Image of inverted narrative. The case of the film Irreversible

Abstract

The article analyzes the case of reversed narration in the film “Irreversible” by Gaspar Noé as a one of the examples of group of films produced in the 1990’s based on the reversed narration and complex, modern construction of the syuzhet. The author stresses that temporal aspects of metonymic contiguity shows parallels with displacement of one event on the axis of chronology and the transitions between erzählte Zeit and Erzählzeit. Narratological reading of retrospective events provides dating back in time from primary narrative as a result of the use of i.e. the internal analepsa showing the time span in the story told. The shift from present and past goes beyond the linear and causal order by drawing on a comparison between J.W. Dunne’s various forms of theory of time and the Moebius strip. The group of events arranged in the causal but discontinuous order show the parallels that precede climax event and initiate the secondary narrative dating back in time.