From its opening moments, Climax makes its intentions unmistakably clear through a now-iconic sequence: a long, collective dance choreography, filmed in an almost unbroken wide shot, which serves as the film’s true point of entry. Far from a simple display of technical prowess, the scene operates as an aesthetic and ideological manifesto for Gaspar Noé’s cinema.

At first, the camera remains frontal, allowing the group to unfold within the bare, industrial space of the building. Bodies collide, separate, challenge one another. Each dancer briefly asserts an individual style — krump, voguing, hip-hop, contemporary dance — before being reabsorbed into the collective. The near absence of editing refuses fragmentation, forcing the viewer to experience the performance in real time, immersed in the physical strain and raw energy of the dancers.

This meticulously calibrated choreography creates an illusion of unity and harmony. The electronic soundtrack functions as a unifying pulse, binding the group into a single rhythmic entity. Yet beneath the apparent celebration lies a quiet tension: excess, competition, and the aggressive occupation of space already hint at the instability of this fragile balance.

The sequence thus performs a crucial function: it contains the entire film in miniature before the narrative has truly begun. Dance becomes a metaphor for the party that will follow — and for its inevitable collapse. What is here control, virtuosity, and communion will later devolve into chaos, loss of restraint, and violence. By foregrounding bodies before psychology, Noé commits fully to a sensory mode of storytelling, where meaning emerges through rhythm, sweat, and exhaustion rather than exposition.

By opening Climax with this hypnotic choreography, Noé deliberately seduces the audience, enveloping it in a moment of collective euphoria before springing the trap. The beauty of movement becomes a prelude to catastrophe, and the ecstasy of dance the first step toward disintegration.