Review of Martyrs (2008) by Richard G — 25 Jul 2010

All right, this one has been sitting precariously on the top of my pile for quite some time, and while in my stronger moments I looked forward to it, in my weaker moments I often talked myself out of watching it, reasoning that I was not in the mood for a gag-inducing torture porn flick. I like those as much as the next person, perhaps even more so, but usually I find I like to eat during and/or after watching a movie. With a film like Martyrs, you're bound to lose any appetite for several days.

What makes--or what is supposed to have made--Martyrs different, separate from the plethora of geek show torture porn--the laughably moronic plotlines of the Saw films, and the tongue-in-cheek madness of the Eli Roth variety--is its fabled placement as an "arthouse" film. I guess anything with subtitles is regarded as such. Anyway, under this impression as I was I knew that the blood, guts, and violence would be that much more intense, and thematically realistic. Going into Martyrs felt more like preparing to watch major surgery from one of those fabled surgery arenas you see on TV sometimes. Not exactly something I would go out of my way to do, but worth the experience never the less.

So I sat down for the evening, prepared to be disgusted and horrified. Both happened, I guess. And if that were the film's only ambition it would have been a great little piece of trashy cinema, in the same drive-in vein as Xtro and Bloodsucking Freaks. But where this film fails, and badly, is in its ambition.

The first hour of Martyrs is tremendous. A mysterious girl, about whom we know very little, other than she was tortured by a mysterious individual or individuals many years ago and managed to escape--and most of this is ascertained through jumpy, disjointed flashbacks--shows up at the suburban home of an upper middle class family, while they are sitting down as a family at the breakfast table discussing their lives the way these types of people are known or believed to do, and goes on a killing rampage with a shotgun. She murders the whole family. Adding a layer to this is the girl's longtime friend, Anna, who, although she does not share the insanity of her torture-surviving bff, shows up at the grisly scene, and like the audience does not know what to make of it. Anna realizes that her friend believed this family to have been responsible for her captivity fifteen years prior, but she also knows that her friend is an unbalanced individual. The murder may have been uninformed, unnecessary, or just plain random. Her friend sees an imaginary friend who cuts her brutally with a straight razor, for God's sake; you can't necessarily take someone like that at face value. There are some twists and turns at this point, and I won't ruin them or go into any detail here, but based on the plot I've already related, there is really only one way the film can continue. I mean, really, do you think for a second that this ordinary average family was really NOT involved in Anna's friend's torture fifteen years ago? Come on, that would make for a very short movie. What the family was involved in is even more nonsensical and intelligence-insulting perhaps than any other film in the subgenre. To say the second half of this movie is absurd is putting it mildly. Martyrs may have been labeled Arthouse, but while I sat through the second half I started thinking about how much more I believed in the plot of Hostel. I mean, at least that could actually have happened--in fact Eli Roth based the idea on a phenomenon that is known to take place in some third world countries (so at least we have that to look forward to as our economy falls to ruin). The same cannot be said about Martyrs.

It's difficult to end a horror film, to find that last powerful image that will remain with the audience. Martyrs tries for this but fails under the weight of its own lofty ambitions. Will there ever be an artsy fartsy film in the gore tradition? Probably. Martyrs, I can say, is not it. I do, however give the film a lot of credit for its violence and upsetting imagery. If you are looking for a torture porn film to haunt your nightmares for a few days, and turn your stomach (also for a few days) then Martyrs is a good bet. You won't be disappointed by the intensity and the depravity, but don't expect more.

Three stars for sheer cinematic evil.