Martyrs (2008)

I have nothing more to add to this ... film. Cruelty with an interesting plot makes the film interesting, but cruelty with a strange or stupid plot - giglet.

One thing that I have noticed about some of the reviews on this film is how bloody, gorey, violent, etc. it is and how it's violent to just be violent. I cannot agree with that statement at all. The film tells a story of revenge at first and then shifts to a psychological thriller for the second half. Lucie is the first half and her story is to make you sympathize with the character while Anna's story is meant to provoke thought. When Lucie'sstory was being shown there was a moment where I thought maybe she had killed this family of four for no reason other than she mistook them for her captors 15 years earlier. I was on the fence about it and so was Anna when she tries to help the wife escape until Lucie kills her with a hammer. It isn't until Lucie ends her own life and Anna finds a woman that has been kept down in their torture room for at least 15 years, did I realize that Lucie wasn't crazy and really truly sympathized with her character. After freeing the woman some people in all black come in and kill the girl and take Anna prisoner as they subject her to horrible experiments designed to break her will and cause her to give up all hope. After awhile she finally does this and upon "letting go" she is able to become a witness, or martyr, and see into the afterlife without having died. This is what the cult like group wanted all along. They wanted to have the knowledge of what was on the other side. The head of the group, a rather old women, comes and asks Anna what she saw. Anna whispers to her what it was but we as the audience never actually know what is said. It is after this that the woman goes into the bathroom and takes her own life. But before she does this she tells one of her servants to "keep denying" when talking about the afterlife. This statement is what the entire film is about. Denial is what keeps us going and keeps us from doing certain things. In the case of the writer it was stopping him from killing himself since he wrote the film while being horribly depressed. Not knowing what the afterlife holds helped him realize he didn't need to kill himself, because if we know what lies behind death then life would be meaningless.

Having seen Pascal Laugier's "The Tall Man", which I absolutely loved, I had heard a lot of praise for his first film, "Martyrs", and finally saw it today (2017) on DVD. I can't believe all the reviewers who praise this film lavishly. It is over 90 minutes of torture porn, and while there is a revenge motive, there is little if any satisfaction to be gained by the victims or the viewers, and it is IMO, the viewers who are the ultimate victims, despite the clever twist at the end. One reviewer said that those who like "Hostel" will probably like this film too, and vice-versa. Well, sorry, for I really liked "Hostel", but this exercise in non-stop cruelty and torture was so over the top as to make it hard to care, and nobody could survive the tortures shown for ten minutes, let alone years. Huge disappointment.

Martyrs is undoubtedly a well-made film. The acting is poignant, honest, and grounded and sucks you right into the screen. The practical effects and use of sound are visceral and nail- biting. Through the lens we see a world that is very refined, elegant, affluent, modern, enriched in the most modern luxuries. The best way I would describe this world is an ice cold chandelier. That's not to say that it's an emotionally nihilistic world similar to what we see in The Shining, because the film is shown through the eyes of the 2 female leads Anna and Lucie: highly sensitive, emotional human beings that you invest in from the beginning, and that is what makes this film so challenging to sit through.Every act of violence is displayed and shown is horrendously ugly. If you are looking for a campy trip to the splatterhouse like Peter Jackson's Dead Alive, then turn away from Martyrs and run in the other direction. It hurts to watch, and it's sad to watch, it makes you sick. If The Exorcist is the scariest movie of all time, then this is the most disheartening movie of all time. I do know that Pascal is not a sadist because he would not be filming from this approach, which I had to learn over time. A sadist's version of the same film would not emotionally involve you, but because it is seen mostly through the eyes of Anna, a very caring and selfless young woman, every moment of battery is seen as it should be: cruel, ugly and terrible. Like Funny Games, It's not a film I would dare watch again; I would honestly rather get a hard elbow jab in the stomach as it would be more palatable. I don't recommend anybody to see it as I would advise anyone else to do. Even planting the idea of talking about it to people that are unaware of Martyrs is kind of irresponsible in my opinion. The one plus side is that if you were saddened, revolted, etc. then you have a heart, and that's a terrific quality.