Martyrs

By chance I came across a trailer on YouTube of a French horror film called Martyrs, which came out in 2008. Based on the comments on the trailer, it was brutal, disturbing, and brilliant. No one had posted the entire movie on YouTube, so I searched free movie watching sites, came across one, and found Martyrs. It was the dubbed version; I would have preferred subtitles but I wasn't about to scour the internet for the subtitled version. Anyway, I settled down and watched it.

I still can't think of how to describe it. It was horrifying, intriguing, and surreal. I didn't expect to be too shocked by the events that unfolded before me, but my jaw actually dropped a couple of times. Yes, there is a lot of violence and gore, but it isn't the shameless, pointless kind. There aren't entrails flying in all directions. The underlying plot of this film is a bit hazy, but I got the general idea that there was this strange, unheard-of organization that chooses people who will suffer unimaginable amounts of pain and agony, in the hopes of communicating with them and learning whether or not there is an afterlife. This plot doesn't reveal itself until more than halfway through the film. The first half was frightening and disturbing, but didn't make much sense, aside from Lucie going Scarface on the family responsible for her hellish childhood.

The fate of Anna near the end is extremely shocking.

I have a lot of unanswered questions after watching this, but it was definitely an eye opener (and a jaw-dropper). What sets this apart from typical slashers is the fact that the director really seemed to be aiming to show the darkest side of humanity, but also the side that is terrifyingly indifferent and entirely self-absorbed. Lucie's own personal suffering, both physical and mental, turns her into a ruthless killer, and in the end, poor Anna is tortured in the worst way imaginable and used as a "seer" into another world, for the selfish interests of others. The director made a bad choice in mashing the underlying plot into the last quarter of the film, but I would recommend this for anyone who enjoys gore and being very, very disturbed.

I experienced a lot of emotions while watching Martyrs. Horror, revulsion, hope, anger, devastation, confusion. I will remember it for a long time.