New Wave French Horror

A magnum opus. One thinks of great and iconic first horror films: Craven's "Last House on the Left", Carpenter's "Halloween", Hooper's "Texas Chainsaw Massacre", Romero's "Night of the Living Dead", Argento's "The Bird with Crystal Plumage". And we should be reminded of these as these are the films that the directors, Alexandre Aja and Gregory Levasseur, studied and adored in their youth. More specifically, they wanted to pay tribute to this new form of horror film which emerged in the early to mid 1970s. But this isn't a big allusion-fest, this is a contemporary extreme thriller. Aja and Levasseur have clearly digested the films they've seen and are capable of using that knowledge to create fantastic film.
Horror Not to Miss List Commentary:
THERE IS NO REASON WHY YOU SHOULD NOT SEE THIS FILM.

Must-see horror. Best to go into this knowing nothing. A new classic, with some of the most gripping gore to splatter the screen in decades. This is one of those movies where I feel the only substantial thing I have to say is, "Why haven't you seen this yet?"

After a second screening, I've noticed some cool details: the address of the house is 666, the film uses fade wipes not to indicate passage of much time but to indicate a shift in perspective (except for once towards the very end), the first time the killer is in the house her shadow appears pregnant. As I recall from the first screening, the house feels incredibly womb-like and I still can't exactly decipher how the director does this other than pure pacing, tension, some of the soundtrack, and the story itself. The sound is brilliant and is responsible for making the kills seem so immediate and vicious. The whole final scene, but especially that final creepy shot is excruciatingly horrifying to the extent that it almost makes me want to quit the horror genre. Few films have delivered such genuine and unforgettable scares. I was left genuinely frightened and creeped out at the conclusion, feeling that same residual horror that The Exorcist leaves stained upon your brain. I'm ratcheting this up to five stars.
"So Fucked Up" highlight: supposedly dead and eyeless policeman rises and fights back

Survival horror for the art house crowd, Calvaire has a unique oddness that drives its deranged story straight into the eyeballs of viewers. The horror here is in the insanity of the captors and the atmosphere of the area where the main character is stranded.

If you want silly excessive gore, this is not your movie. If you want a captive survival horror narrative that dares to flirt with believable mental illness and bothers to use the camera and cinematography to tell the story as much as dialogue, this is it.

This is middle of nowhere backwards crazy people done to a perfect chime; look no further for your pigfucking scene needs. I hereby declare that I believe this film is superior to "Deliverance".

"Most fucked up" highlight: the village dancing around the piano

A movie that really creeped *me* out at points and also has virtually NO BLOOD in it. This has been recommended to me many times, and I can see why as it is so tightly edited and directed for real jumpscare flair, not cheap out-of-nowhere jumpscares, but those really good ones where you anticipate the jump scare to come at a particular moment and the film then fucks with your head by doing the jumpscare just a little after or before the expected effect. I also love the "look what we snuck into the shot" moments, where a subtle element you may not recognize at first is soon identified as a hooded intruder or attacking limb. I know this is a great horror movie, because throughout it, I am earnestly thinking of how I would react (first thought revealed my American bias: 'where are these people's shotguns and revolvers?') though I can't relate to the victims on any superficial levels (besides the guy being a writer). SPOLIER People tout the ending as a "twist"; it's not but rather an interesting detail that makes the story even scarier and reveals to the audience their own ageist biases.

Just another "we went down the wrong road and shacked up with a family of cannibalistic serial killers" movie. It's not a poorly done movie, it's just not anything substantially great. If you like the Wolf Creek, Turistas, or Hostel treatments of this subject matter, then you should like this. There aren't any memorable scares, some decent cinematography but the images do not amount to a consistent piece like another new French horror film, A L'Interieur or the watershed work of Switchblade Romance (Haute Tension). The little bit of saving grace in this movie is the Gothic horror aesthetic of a demented family hiding secrets that kicks in for the last thirty minutes with the revelation (SPOILER) that the "people' in the mines are the deformed offspring of the daughters' that the father wanted killed, but instead were hidden from him within the mines.
For the script my biggest complaint is that the fanatical Nazi patriarch speaks French instead of mixing more German and raising his children to speak German, as he has given them proper German names. He does throw a bit of German here and there, and even a little English, but not enough.

I loved this. Tiny set, never lets up on the strangeness, deals with the occult alongside real-life horrors, and still packs in some great gore.

Using the tinniest of settings - one prison cell - the film stages a grand odyssey and one never tires of the setting.

As usual, I've got to complain that I don't think the trans character was handled in a manner consistent with the aspirations of trans-aware advocate-artists like myself.

All of the (four main and one temporary secondary) characters are complex and intriguing. For once, I'm not really that incensed at a "twist" ending, though I do think it was not appropriately foreshadowed and a montage of clips that were supposed to foreshadow the reveal shown right before the reveal is way too cliche and should have been cut.

Overall, the feeling of being utterly trapped with something so cryptic and powerful and surrounded by dangerous people is perfectly conveyed. I do wonder if there are modern prisons that are this shitty, though.

An interesting take on the zombie model. No cannibalism, but plenty of scenes that will remind the astute zombie viewer of many classic shots.

This is a hypnotic film utterly self-contained and deserving of the proclamation as genius.

I was skeptical of this film, as I am skeptical of any movie that uses rape to sensationalize itself and gain publicity. Most films like that, the rape scene is the only decent part and the rest of the film is dreck. Well, this whole film is just astonishing, blinding, and mind-warping.

The camerawork had me in a trance state, and it is some of the most amazing cinematography I've seen in ANY recent film. For people who clearly do not know anything about film technique and openly admit that with their negative reviews of the cinematography: this isn't the handheld crap you gobble up at the box office, you just think that because you think "oh camera's moving and that means they mustn't have bothered setting up the shot", when actually these are some of the most cleverly coordinated sequences in film history.

I love the reverse linear implemented here, as it really drives home the film's spoken point: "Time ruins everything".

There is NO excuse for anyone serious about film not to view this entire work.

Hot Gay Sex commentary: another one on the list wherein the hot gay sex is a minor detail in a large shock/exploitation plot centered on rape. Still, the third scene of the film is entirely set in an uber butch leather/BDSM sex den, and features some quite memorable snippets, especially the guy begging to get fisted. There's also loads of male frontal nudity here - something Americans know next to nothing about.

"So Fucked Up" highlight: Bashing in the guy's face - it's one of the greater special effects achievements in history; it's HOW ONE DOES practical and CG together.

I liked this movie a helluva lot more than most reviewers.

The only thing to this film's detriment is that its plots elements do NOT resolve themselves, which can easily leave a viewer feeling cheated. It's one thing to be subtle and give answers without being obvious, it is another to never give any answers but instead pile on more questions. This film does the latter, leaving an unresolvable mess of a plot in its wake. The ambiguity would be acceptable if it fit with the mode of the film, or if the details added up under careful scrutiny, but it doesn't.

The cinematography is beautiful, and I thought this was one of the most atmospheric ghost movies I've ever seen in color film. I was intrigued and chilled by many moments in the movie, which is tough to do to a seasoned student of horror genre. I thought the sets were amazing - true stunners of art design and lighting. The visual language in the film has a lingering creepiness that even revisits me if I just think on the movie.

SPOILERS: I disagree with many viewers who peg the film as a psychological thriller, and insist that it is very much a Gothic ghost story.

Minimal dialogue, a film that tells its story with images instead. At first the pacing and cinematography were hypnotizing, but an hour in, the slowness was effecting my viewing experience. It's clearly a very visually calculated movie, and obviously wants to be considered art house.

Due to the minimal dialogue and articulate angles, this movie causes some plot ambiguity that I hoped would not be frustrating, that it would all sort of come together in the end and that acute observation could carry the bulk of the film. It does to an extent, but still too many relationships are left unexplained and there are some disposable characters that simply muddle the story. The main thing I longed for was some more revelation about the dynamic between Dr. Leo and Dr. Brown. The Coré character is chilling, and she certainly makes this fit in a "horror" mode, though it is primarily an art house mystery that emphasizes sex and sensuality with its many flesh-on-flesh closeups.

"Most Fucked Up" highlight: Coré at work on the "boy next door", Gallo's character (Dr.Brown) literally eats pussy

"New Wave French Horror": this is more an extreme cinema/art house film than horror, but the gory scenes and cannibalistic subject qualify it

first screening: half awake, but still loved it

Tentative rating of 4 on first screening. This is a movie that has to sink in and I need to watch again before I can give an accurate rating.

Two things can definitely be said: this film scores huge points for originality, and the second sequence is just the coolest "fuck off!" to Michael Haneke's Funny Games.
_
March 17, 2009: Rating revised 4 to 4.5.

Now my full breakdown, including many SPOILERS will commence. If you have yet to see this movie, DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER.

Laugier gives us not one, but two astonishing and amazing films. The film has a definite divide, with the first segment being a revenge tale wherein former victim becomes murderer plagued by psychological demons and assisted by a best friend who has been by her side throughout both her victimization and realization of revenge. The second segment is a "torture porn", except it's not so much of the "porn" variety but of the Salo school of torture film as it does have a driving philosophical point.

The makeup and gore are beyond astonishing. This sets new levels of achievement for the genre and proves that the studio chose wisely when they signed Laugier to do the Hellraiser remake. This film is certainly this year's A L'Interieur. Both the imagined demon girl and the actual tortured girl are incredibly frightening and left me shivering.

The high tech basement room instantly reminded me of the setting for the climax in Laugier's previous horror outing Saint Ange.

An interesting thing I noted in the version I saw: once the controlling financiers of the Martyrs project are revealed, the head woman often refers to what the subtitles translate as Anna's "transformation". Using my rough ear for French, I am sure that what she is really saying is transfiguration, which ole wikipedia tells you is "a momentary transformation of a man or woman into someone having the aspect of the divine". This better fits the context and explanation of what the financiers are trying to achieve, and hopefully it's corrected in the DVD english release and I just downloaded a crap subtitle.