Torture Porn? Hardly.

This isn't necessarily a movie "review" per se, because I generally like most of the films I end up watching. Plus I don't usually review much of anything save for the occasional music album. I guess this would be more like a reaction to the viewing.

It's been a while since I've dedicated a couple of hours to just sitting and watching a movie. So, feeling the need to make some kind of progress on the movies piling up in my queue, I selected Martyrs, a French horror film released in 2008. I hadn't seen any trailers and knew absolutely nothing about the movie aside from the fact that some people had labeled it "torture porn" like the Saw or Hostel series. (Now don't get it twisted, I like a good scare every now and then, but I don't pick and choose movies just because there's someone getting sliced up or ripped apart in them. I do have some semblance of taste. I think.)


The movie drew me in immediately, with scenes of a screaming, tortured child escaping from her demented captors in a decrepit industrial building and running half-naked down the street. Lucie is institutionalized and ends up befriending Anna, another patient, who eventually becomes a protector of sorts. Lucie is periodically tormented and attacked by a gross-looking demon, which naturally freaks her the hell out, so it's usually up to Anna to calm her down and dress her wounds. Fast-forward fifteen years, and the two are still close friends, but Lucie believes that she has found the couple responsible for her childhood capture and abuse, so she goes to their house with shotgun in hand.

It's hard to post my reaction to the movie without giving away any spoilers, but let's say the first and second thirds of the film conform somewhat to traditional supernatural and physical horror movie standards, with the requisite blood and gore (and there is a lot of blood and gore) and accompanying squishing and crunching sound effects. The second act ends where lesser movies would be happy to end, and it's the third portion of the film that really puts it on another level. Yes, the scenes are drawn-out and physically gruesome -- and had me squirming and cursing under my breath -- but the psychological components were what truly disturbed me. I wouldn't consider it "torture porn," however, because I don't believe any of those scenes were gratuitous (although I'm quite positive that many, many viewers will vehemently disagree with me).

Director Pascal Laugier knew what he was doing. The vast majority of horror movies are content to treat the viewers solely as casual observers, so that there is a slight disconnect between them and the protagonist. Martyrs, before and especially after certain motives are revealed, succeeds in both shell-shocking the audience and immersing them almost fully into the sheer brutality of it all, because there is a reason for it. Call it empathy or at least a deeper understanding of the perverse forces at work within the film, but don't call it "torture porn."

The ending leaves much room for interpretation; I'm still trying to work out an explanation in my head that I'm comfortable with, but in a good way. These are the types of movies that I love -- uncompromising films that present an aspect of the human condition in such a fashion that forces you to come to terms with it through the director's vision, but allows you to make your own take on it after you leave the theater (and make great coffee-table conversations).

Obviously this isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I would recommend Martyrs to anyone with a (very) strong stomach -- and a curiosity for just how deep a movie can take you inside your own head.