Martyrs

Martyrs (2008)

50% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 24 reviews)

Runtime: 99 minutes

Directed by: Pascal Laugier

Starring: Morjana Alaoui, Mylene Jampanoi, Catherine Begin, Robert Toupin

From: A bunch of companies, including TCB Film, Wild Bunch, and Canal +

Before I talk about this foreign horror flick, I have two things to mention.

1. Yes, I did change the layout on here a few days ago. It was to do something different. Hopefully you don’t think of this as being lesser than the original design.

2. I plan on seeing quite a few films on the big screen in the next few months, plus I have some reviews already in the can and I’ll just have to post them at the appropriate time. So, it’ll be more active here for the rest of the summer compared to the past.

Now, onto this French/Canadian movie which is not a French-Canadian movie. What I mean is that it was made by both French and Canadian film companies and filmed in Quebec, yet it’s not what you’d call a French-Canadian movie because it happened to be filmed there… but before I confuse any of you more…

This is a horror film that I’ll say qualifies under the “torture porn” genre. It’s prettier than most in that genre, but still… this is not for the weak of heart, or those of you used to watching those limp horror flicks. It’s not easy to watch, and that’s what most have said about it. Take very seriously that it’s rated R (and I’m surprised they got away with it) “for disturbing/severe aberrant behavior involving strong bloody violence, torture, child abuse and some nudity.” Believe it.

The movie starts off with a young girl, Lucie (played as an adult by Jampanoi) who escapes from a torture chamber, where she’s been for a long time. She ends up in an orphanage with another young girl, Anna (played as an adult by Alaoui), and after a brief amount of time with them as kids-where you see that, understandably, Lucie is still traumatized-you spent most of them with them as adults and yep, Lucie is still traumatized, haunted by her demons from the past. So, one day she snaps and she goes out for revenge. I won’t reveal what happens after that as that’d totally spoil things. But, it’s stuff that can be extremely difficult to watch. You know, graphic violence and watching women get tortured.

Still, I was able to watch it and I was interested in where the weird tale was going to… then, the last half hour happens. Like others have said online, things go downhill there. Then, the ending… I didn’t care for it, and I’ll leave it at that, along with what the story was actually about. So, despite the nice acting (those girls having to do what they did in this movie… wow), the pretty cinematography and the way it was filmed, I otherwise I have to say that while it was interesting to see the movie, I’d never watch it again and it’s not “holy shit awesome” as many have proclaimed.

By the way, of course there’s going to be an American remake of this, and it will likely be toned down quite a bit from the original. Just recently it’s been announced that they’d like for Kristen Stewart to be in it, and boy that has people mad. I don’t know if it’s exactly fair, as from what I understand she isn’t a bad actress and it’s not like if she’s in it, it’ll automatically be as soft and wussy as a Twilight film.

So, if you do want to see this, be prepared for a challenging movie to watch, and maybe you’ll like it more than I did. And yeah, this should be seen rather than the American version, whenever it gets made and released.

I’ll be back on Monday night with at least one new review.