Gaspar Noé’s Love is anything but pornography. Pornography makes no attempt to delve into the psychology of the humans portrayed within; it contains actors as models, rather than actors as characters with any sort of depth. While Murphy (Karl Glusman), Elektra (Aomi Muyock) and Omi (Klara Kristin), the three chief characters, may not be the most complex individuals you’ll come across in the cinema this year, they still have hopes and dreams and aspirations, and undoubtedly transcend the notion of “the pornographic model” by a long shot.

Love has such a loosely constructed narrative that it’s difficult to summarize, but it essentially examines the mind and memories of its American protagonist Murphy, now married and with a child, as he reminisces on the greatest love affair of his life with French ex-girlfriend Elektra. What sparks this nostalgic exploration is a phone call from Elektra’s mother, letting Murphy know that she hasn’t heard from her daughter in months and wonders if he has any knowledge of her whereabouts.

The opening scene is a lengthy static shot of Murphy and Elektra engaged in an explicit, unsimulated sexual act. This directorial decision, which paves the way for the remainder of the film’s imagery, should inspire excitement from audiences, but does the excitement hold up for the rest of Love’s 135-minute runtime? Not quite, because at least half of the film turns out to be repetitive scenes of other sexually graphic acts, from different angles and in different positions, but dull and homogeneous in almost every other way.

It’s clear that Noé’s goal here is to expose his audience to such an immense degree of sexual imagery that it would begin to feel like a natural and comfortable thing to view in a non-pornographic film. Unfortunately, it has the opposite effect; desensitizing the viewer to the sex being portrayed, with excitement quickly fading into exhaustion midway through the second act. At least all of the sex scenes made the dialogue-heavy sequences—like the intense verbal matches between Murphy and Elektra, which effectively portray the bi-polar, love-hate nature of fiercely passionate relationships—that much more fascinating.

Unfortunately, these rare, existential moments in Love aren’t portrayed in enough detail, or given enough screen time, to really pack much of a punch. They come and go, forgotten among the sex scenes. The emotional peak of the film comes in the third act during a beautiful moment of vulnerability for Murphy. He sits weeping in a bathtub while holding his child, who is also weeping. This moment casts the protagonist in a state of pure nakedness more than any elongated scene of copulation. The female characters, on the other hand, are one-dimensional from start to finish and seem to exist merely as sexual objects for Murphy.

All of that said, Love, much like Noé’s previous two films, Enter the Void and Irreversible, is an impressive technical achievement. His cinematographer, Benoit Debie, experiments with longer takes, carefully framed static shots and a camera that hovers above its main characters for most of the film. The fragmented editing style works wonderfully with the non-linear narrative and transports the viewer from past to present smoothly and with meticulous pacing. However, technical greatness doesn’t constitute a great film, and the majority of Love feels like digging into what looks like a delicious cake, only to find more and more icing on the inside. It may be Noé’s tamest and most grounded film yet, but that is not necessarily what audiences want from him as a director. He’d likely find greater success returning to the psychedelic, hyper-violent shock cinema style that he’s known for. It is there that his niche audience will find satisfaction.

A version of this review was originally published as part of our coverage of the 2015 Cannes Film Festival.

French filmmaker Gaspar Noé isn’t afraid to push boundaries. His previous films Irreversible and Enter the Void dared us to look away from difficult subject matter, while dazzling us with technical visuals and clever non-linear narratives. So when he premiered his latest film Love at Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, audiences weren’t exactly surprised that the film is a provocative sexual melodrama shot in 3D. Especially given early marketing campaigns for the film included “NSFW” in bold letters everywhere and Noe confessing the film is meant to “give guys a hard-on and make girls cry.” But the critical reaction from Cannes suggested the film is a bit more gentle than you may expect—including our own review which stated, “It may be Noé’s tamest and most grounded film yet.”

This new trailer is safe for work, though it does walk a thin line. Love opens in 3D Theaters in New York on October 30th, 2015 and expands to more on November 6th. Below is a brief synopsis of the film:

Murphy is an American living in Paris who enters a highly sexually and emotionally charged relationship with the unstable Electra. Unaware of the seismic effect it will have on their relationship, they invite their pretty neighbor into their bed.

As we ramp up to the summer movie season, the newswire this week was dominated by upcoming Star Wars and superhero films. First, last weekend’s Star Wars Celebration brought us a new trailer for The Force Awakens and the next cutest robot ever. Later in the week, we heard that Nightcrawler‘s Riz Ahmed was in talks to play a leading role in the first Star Wars anthology film Rogue One. For the other big Disney property coming out this year, apparently some German theaters are boycotting The Avengers: Age of Ultron due to the studio’s asking for too much money per ticket sale. But that might not be as bad as the predicament Warner Bros. founds itself in when its trailer for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice leaked just days prior to a scheduled IMAX trailer release event, forcing the studio to officially release the trailer sooner than they planned. Oh, and then there’s the mostly negative response that trailer received online. We also got that Jared Leto Joker image shocking into our brains, never to be forgotten. With all this circling, how you honestly keep up with anything else? Check out other news you may have missed last week below!

Phil Lord and Christopher Miller Set to Make a Spider-Man Animated Movie

OK, so we’re not completely done with superhero film news, but this bit is a little more enticing. Phil Lord and Christopher Miller have made a fine career out of adapting uninspired properties into intelligent and fun films – maybe they are the perfect filmmakers to get Sony out of their Spider-Man rut. Announced at Sony’s presentation at CinemaCon, the duo are set to direct an animated version of everyone’s favorite web-slinger to be released in 2018. This, of course, isn’t the first time Spider-Man has been animated, with multiple popular television series. If Sony has to release a film of their own while also handing off the character on loan to Marvel Studios, an animated film is probably the only way to differentiate it. And hiring Lord & Miller attached to write and direct the film is probably the only way to make it not feel like a total cash grab.

Ang Lee’s Next Film to be Shot at 120 Frames Per Second

Also announced at Sony’s CinemaCon presentation, Ang Lee is currently working with Sony to shoot his next film with a revolutionary new camera that can capture 120 images per second. According to the Hollywood Reporter, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk will also be shot in the suddenly blasé 3D with 4k projection. A few years back, Peter Jackson’s first film in The Hobbit series was projected at 48 fps, paving the way for the next trend to keep us going to the movies, but this is a bold step up from that. Many of the technical details are still unclear, but it will definitely be interesting to learn more and see the results.

Virgin Mountain and Bridgend Biggest Winners at Tribeca

The 2015 Tribeca Film Festival is in the books, with Dagur Kári’s Virgin Mountain and Jeppe Rønde’s Bridgend sweeping the World Narrative Competition awards. Virgin Mountain took home Best Narrative Feature, Best Actor and Best Screenplay, graciously leaving Best Actress, Cinematography and Editing for Bridgend. Camilla Nielsson’s look at the the adoption of a new constitution in Zimbabwe, Democrats, won Best Documentary Feature. We saw Bridgend, but were pretty mixed on the film. You can find the complete list of competition award winners at Indiewire. While you’re at it, check out all of our Tribeca 2015 coverage here!

Gaspar Noé upcoming NSFW film Love

A few days after the competition and Directors’ Fortnight schedules for the 2015 Cannes Film Festival were released, a stimulating addition has been made. According to the Dissolve, film provocateur Gaspar Noé will be showing off his newest film, Love, at the festival. Though we know Love is a three-hour 3D porno, it is supposedly more joyous and lighthearted than Noé’s previous films Irreversible and Enter the Void. With Lars von Trier still banned from Cannes, his spot for controversy has been up-for-grabs, so perhaps it will be filled by the Argentinian auteur.

Trailer of the Week: Nightingale

After David Oyelowo’s disappointing snub at this year’s Oscars, I was very interested in seeing where his career would go. Oyelowo has long been putting in great performances in small roles in films like The Paperboy and A Most Violent Year, but could he sustain being a leading man? Well, by the looks of Nightingale, where he seems to be the only on-screen character, he’s doubling down. The film debuted at the 2014 Los Angeles Film Festival, but will now get a broad release thanks to HBO Films, when it will show on the cable channel on Friday, May 29. Check out a tease of Oyelowo’s powerful solo performance in the trailer below!

It is difficult to describe Enter The Void in words because the film is completely about the visuals, which results in more of an experience than a traditional film. It will likely be unlike anything else that you have seen before. However, you should know going in, it is not an easy film to watch. The long run-time of 161 minutes is mostly comprised of incredibly vivid flashing colors and shot mostly in subjective camera (from the point of view of the main character), which makes watching this visual work of art overwhelming at times.

Unlike the visuals, the storyline itself is not very complex. A drug dealer named Oscar (Nathaniel Brown) lives in Japan with his sister Linda. The two made a pact to never leave each other as children and have been living together since their parents died in a car crash. At the beginning of Enter The Void, we see Oscar using a drug called DMT (which is said to have a similar experience as death), because of his interest in the “Tibetan Book Of The Dead”. In what was thought to be a routine drug exchange with a friend, Oscar finds himself trying to escape from the local police after he discovers it is a setup. He manages to lock himself in a bathroom where he tries to flush the drug evidence down the drain. The police become impatient and shoot him through the door. He then reappears as a ghost to watch over his sister for the remainder of the film.

The camera work and CGI are unbelievably well done and deserves every bit of recognition it has received, if not more. Over 100 graphic artists were used to create the effects on the film. Every single scene was digitally altered to include the CGI. The end result is a beautiful film with lots of vibrant strobe neon lights and unorthodox camera techniques. A great example of this is at the very beginning when the subjective camera view is in play. When the character blinks, the screen goes dark for a frame or two, mimicking the effect of seeing exactly what the character does.

Enter The Void is one long psychedelic trip. I almost feel like I did a dis-service to it watching it sober, but the film does such a good job of making you feel like you are on the drugs the characters are on. However, if you suffer from epilepsy you may not want to watch this, it has constant flashes of bright colors that could be dangerous.

The story does not really start picking up until about an hour in. So the film as a whole moves too slow and is unnecessarily long for how little of a plot there actually is. It does not help that most scenes are not real time but more like half speed. The slow moving transition between scenes is very unique, but ultimately becomes overused and repetitive. After a while this effect starts to become frustrating.

If you are looking for a visual cinema experience that you most likely have never had before, look no further than Enter The Void. Gaspar Noe sends you on a psychedelic trip that can really only be described as superbly unique. But know what it demands dedication as a viewer to sit through the entire film.