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Catherine Bégin, Emilie Miskdjian, Isabelle Chasse

Tells the story of Anna, once a missing little girl, found wandering a year later on a country road virtually catatonic after suffering some sort of physical abuse. She grows into a comely young woman...( read more  read more... ), but she's got serious issues. She also has a close friend, Lucie, who she ultimately calls after she finds herself in an unusual house in the middle of the forest. There's something very disturbing about the Bauhaus-esque home, something Anna can't quite put her finger on.

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71% liked it

4,414 ratings

Critics

54% liked it

24 critics

R, 1 hr. 37 min.

Directed by: Pascal Laugier

Release Date: May 1, 2008

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DVD Release Date: March 24, 2009

Stats: 1,186 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (1,186)

  • mrpopcorn
    October 31, 2009
    mrpopcorn
    "They did not finish to be alive..."

    A young woman's quest for revenge against the people who kidnapped and tormented her as a child leads her and a friend, who is also a victim of child abuse, on a terrifying journey into a living hell of depravity.

    ...( read more)2 face="Century Schoolbook">REVIEW
    It's a rare horror film that lingers in my mind for days after viewing, gnawing at my subconscious, but Martyrs, from French director Pascal Laugier, achieves just that thanks to its continuously evolving storyline and sheer, unrelenting brutality that is guaranteed to disturb.

    A shocker form the word go, Martyrs opens as a young girl, Lucie, escapes from a dilapidated building where she has been held captive and subjected to torture by persons unknown. Fifteen years later, a now fully grown but mentally disturbed Lucie (the lovely Mylène Jampanoï) eventually manages to track down those responsible for her abuse and, accompanied by best friend Anna (Morjana Alaoui), proceeds to exact revenge.

    Justice is swift, with a shotgun toting Lucie coldly dispatching her targets (and their innocent children for good measure), but even though Lucie's nightmare seems as though it is finally over, Anna's is just about to begin.

    Martyrs might not be perfect, with a final act that is a little too drawn out (and arguably unnecessary altogether), but there's no denying the power of this film as a whole: it's the cinematic equivalent of a flurry of punches to the gut which leaves one feeling both queasy and breathless.

    Laugier displays incredible control of his material, delivering tense horror and nerve shredding terror whilst also splashing bright red gore across every frame. By the closing credits, even the most bloodthirsty of gore-hounds will have had their fill of shotgun wounds, lump-hammer attacks, cutthroat razor slashing and skin removal, and although there are points at which I feel it might have been wiser to end the film, Martyrs' ultimately ambiguous ending does at least invite conjecture and debate about such lofty subjects as religion and the afterlife.
  • g0disd3ad
    October 12, 2009
    g0disd3ad
    One of the sickest horror movie I've seen in quite a while, I loved it
  • ceWEBrity
    July 21, 2009
    ceWEBrity
    There is no middle ground with Martyrs. Surely if you know anything about the film at all, it is its divisive nature. I will tell you now that I thought the movie was absolutely despicable but it also comes with my emphatic recommendation. If you've got the nerve, see it, because...( read more) taking in others' opinions about it has been absolutely fascinating to me. I will attempt to keep this review free of spoilers, because as the director says, it is at its most effective as a virgin experience. I will be discussing the ending, but with as little plot detail as possible. I was tempted to just completely spoil it without remorse but maturity soon took hold of me and I decided not to deprive any potential viewers of what will surely be a great deal of complex thought.

    I am giving it one star only to put it ahead of Funny Games. This film is about the greatest "fuck you" that anyone could ever give to Funny Games. Pascal Laugier effortlessly upstages Michael Haneke's attempts at shocking, contemptuous violence and does it without the self-congratulation, or the winking, or the breaking of the fourth wall. As a condemnation of violence, it is infinitely more effective, but the fact that the movie even exists in the first place renders it self-defeating. Laugier's preface to his own film is necessary watching - to see him speak with candid excoriation of both himself and the monstrous work he has created is oddly cathartic. It let me know, at least, that this exists for more of a reason than the brutalization of pretty young French women.

    At the same time, though, this is a through-and-through horror movie, and this genre is simply the wrong place to attempt a narrative like this. Horror inherently fetishizes assault and deformation of the human condition, physically, mentally and emotionally. For all its sanctimony and reverence of Anna, there still exists a harrowing ten minute scene where a woman mercilessly executes a family. We still watch a fleshy apparition ripped straight from J-horror scuttle through a house, bumping and jolting in whatever ways would most scare a lulled audience. The violence is not obscured or metaphorized, but instead lingered on, taken in. This may be justifiable in the final half hour, where this incessant brutality and torture are ascribed an arguable purpose, but everything preceding is there simply to cash in on shock and cheap scares. Where Martyrs would attempt to transcend its genre, it instead falls exceptionally hard into nearly every one of its pitfalls. Especially telling is a spot of gratuitous lesbianism that dismantles the film's "chivalrous" intentions and shows much of its true colors: a flick for the gorehounds to bask in.

    That last half hour, meant to buoy the rest of the film, amounts to little more than an apologist cop-out, suddenly offering viewers something to mull over while still beating the hell out of Anna in the most exhibitionist manner possible. Martyrs ultimately amounts to the movie cashing in your hour and a half of misery and disgust for one very simple question: "what happens after we die?" Someone here learns (or does she?) and it drives her to act very oddly. Past that, we don't know anything. This one universal question is the movie's sole currency, its crutch for presenting this macabre, exploitative gallery. Perhaps Laugier was feeling awfully guilty writing this screenplay and tried to sneak in a little purpose. Two minutes of sophomoric twaddle about martyrdom and vision, however, do absolutely nothing to assuage my guilt and overall sense of dirtiness after watching this movie.

    A film is generally successful in my eyes if it makes me feel something about the characters. Martyrs did, but what overwhelmed this was how I felt about the people responsible for making the film. As a movie viewer, I have a fairly steely aesthetic line, but so much of this movie shows wanton disrespect for anything even resembling thoughtful use of violence. For all its probing questions about the afterlife, and for all the tail-chasing masturbatory discussion of the nebulous ending, Martyrs is not brilliant. It is not above its genre; it is one of its worst examples. It is an overworked, garish fetishization of violence. There is far less thematic depth than it wants to believe. It's not even well-shot past the gripping first five minutes and the music, a half-assed call back to mid-70s Argento, is embarrassing. But maybe I'm wrong. I hate the movie, but I'm not upset that I watched it, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't compelled completely against my own cognitive volition. I wanted to see it through, primarily wondering if it could redeem itself for atrocity after atrocity. I don't think so. Perhaps in the hands of a director with a grasp of brevity and restraint, this project could have been saved, and worked that thoughtful speck of quality into a truly great movie. The real talent here lies not with the director, though, but with the makeup artist (who as I understand recently committed suicide), and that is where Martyrs falters.

    You should watch it, though. Consider this a recommendation.
  • MovieGeek13
    May 27, 2009
    MovieGeek13
    Now this is a horror movie! A French-Canadian co-production, Martyrs comes in the wake of a new movement in French filmmaking that takes horror to completely new levels of extreme. These films are so gory, so relentless in their realistic depictions of what feels like neverendi...( read more)ng violence, that they might make "gore-hounds" turn away in dusgust.
    But Martyrs is out to do more than just exploit violence like so many shitty American filmmakers (yes, I'm looking at you Eli Roth). It begs you to consider actions as a means to an end. It doesn't critique, but it forces you to witness how some people have no limit. To get what they want, they will do whatever it takes; the end justifies the means. And in this case, does it? If you're able to withstand the whole ordeal, this is definitely a film that will spark intellectual discussion, a sign of a pretty damn good movie.
  • briandeguelle
    May 18, 2009
    briandeguelle
    I can only really welcome this to horror fans and of the gene. I sat down thinking this was going to be a above standard revenge flick with a glop of gore flown in. Well yes u do get that but also the movie splits in half and because another film which I was surprised about, but...( read more) I won?t spotal this for you. It?s very rare for a movie to actually make me shiver but this movie did and at the end, the climax is not pleasant at all. You been warned the shock value rides hide and I give 4 stars because of this, I really cannot say I like the movie but maybe this is the whole point. Certainly not a movie you could watch again in a hurry. I give due to the French because at the moment there is a wave of horror movies coming out and been of a higher standard then are Hollywood fave and maybe ,just maybe they will learn from this that a good horror isn?t just for the teenages audience or have happy endings or have to be another remake or reboot. The French are striking us with very raw, edgey captuvaining and intelliant horror movies and martyrs hold true to this and is keeping the flame strong!
  • quichefolle
    November 19, 2009
    quichefolle
    LA VACHE !!! Difficile de rester indiferente. Foutraque et Mature a la fois, merdiquement mystique et incandescent. Bref une experience a vivre.
  • DragonEyeMorrison
    November 3, 2009
    DragonEyeMorrison
    Can't we just tie to a rocket all the idiots that make these movies, and launch them into the sun?
  • blafusel
    November 1, 2009
    blafusel
    insane. less what's being shown, but more the tone of how it's being shown. sickening. excellent.
  • DarkVenom66
    October 31, 2009
    DarkVenom66
    Just an awesome film, its a tough watch with it being brutal and everything but well directed and one that has to be watch.
  • spacecowgirlww
    October 31, 2009
    spacecowgirlww
    I am really not quite sure what to think of this film. It is definitely very well done. It kept me captivated all through, but there were so many moments where I just didn't want to be watching but couldn't look away.
    It's disturbing in of itself that someone could make a film t...( read more)his disturbing,

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