martyrs ( 2008 film )
poiler warning: this article reveals some plot details of the 2008 film martyrs. we’d recommend watching it before reading .
left, bailey noble in the american remake of the french horror film “martyrs. ” right, mylène jampanoï in the original “martyrs, ” from 2008 .
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the film’s french release is slated for 2008 through the distribution arm of wild bunch, who are also handling international sales .
published at: dec. 28, 2008, 11: 04 p. m. cst by headgeek
pascal laugier ‘s 2008 french film, martyrs, is one hardcore horror movie. like plenty of other successful foreign horror films, it’s gotten the u. s. remake treatment. an american version of martyrs has been in the works for over five years now, and today we’re getting our first real glimpse at the film. watch the martyrs trailer after the jump .
unless you' re a fan of the actresses involved, i really can' t imagine that viewers will take much away from watching the martyrs remake. if you want to be told this story, just stick with the 2008 french film .
martyrs 2016 is an entertaining, fun and at times brutal horror film that will probably delight the casual horror fan .
the controversial film was similar to the graphic, torture - porn film franchises in the us begun with saw (2004) and hostel (2005), although more compelling with greater intellectual significance. when the divisive film debuted at the cannes film festival in 2008, it caused many audience members to walk out. the final 15 minutes of the unpleasant film was considered unflinchingly horrendous in its portrayal of cruelty .
i know this comment is a year later than the rest but i’ve only recently watched this film. . no film has had the effect on me like martyrs did, i have watched a siberian film and films like 120 days of sodum and found then nothing compared to martyrs. . the way the film was shot, actually i’m not even goin to try and sound intelligent, the film stick with me… great review 🙂
remaking martyrs with a
glimmer of hope ,
however, is a gargantuan mistake, and ruins the main point of the film .
photo: pascal laugier' s' martyrs .
credit: canal + .
i wonder if stamm has seen martyrs... green obviously missed suspiria .
and it is through this invitation that we, too, may be martyrs .
for the first 50 minutes, martyrs 2015 is following the exact same track as martyrs 2008. when it finally starts to diverge and take its own path, it' s to the film' s detriment. as it goes on, it becomes more and more apparent that the story has undergone a very stereotypical americanization process, a whitewashing to make it more palatable to a wider audience .
ethics is an area i am very interested in within film studies. you have encouraged me to re - watch this film with the above questions in thought. martyrs has always intrigued me. wonderful article .
the' martyrs' remake already has already been filmed... - bloody disgusting
horror, movie trailers, kevin goetz, mark l. smith, martyrs, michael goetz
perhaps more than any other horror film, martyrs demonstrates the range of the genre' s capabilities to find ways to excite, provoke, and disturb us .
martyrs trailer & film clip - 2016 horror remake subscribe for more: urltoken a woman and her childhood friend seek out revenge on those who victimized and abused them .
i' ve never been into this sort of torture porn and martyrs doesn' t convince me .
martyrs is an absolute recommend, but only to those who are willing to accept the film on its own uncompromising terms. all others are advised to stay well clear away .
i’m very interesting in the discussion above regarding ‘witnessing’ – how does martyrs encourage us to question our participatory role in the film experience? are we trespassing on the witnessing of martyrdom? is this a scene that belongs to our eyes? it seems to raise questions about how easily we comply with the ‘film eye’ or ‘film body’ .
williams, “film bodies: gender, genre, excess” in film quarterly, 44: 4, summer 1991, 2 - 13), 4. ↩
sooo close! ! - dang guess i' m really gonna have to check out martyrs ...
there is some talent behind this remake. it’s written by the revenant co - writer mark l. smith and directed by the goetz brothers (scenic route). that should make the martyrs remake look slightly more appealing, but anchor bay seems to be dumping the film and the trailer leaves you wanting to revisit the original 2008 film instead. in a q & a on reddit, the goetz brothers acknowledged they wouldn’t managed to equal the violence of the original but still planned on pushing boundaries :
writer - director pascal laugier' s 2008 french horror film
martyrs
has a well - earned reputation as one of the scariest, goriest movies ever made — so extreme that it pushes past exploitation into art. the new american remake from screenwriter mark l. smith (
the revenant
) and directors kevin and michael goetz sells a softer version of laugier' s vision. the result is pointlessly repellent .
final preparations are underway before shooting begins in canada in march on martyrs, the second feature by pascal laugier .
great analysis. though the title could have had “martyrs” in quotes so it was clearer what it was about .
nobody has mentioned that the title of the film is “martyrs, ” as in plural. all of the other people that had been tortured would have been classed as victims. both the anna and the old lady are martyrs, albeit of a different type. i think that informs the “keep on doubting” response .
( 1962), a film about survivor’s guilt and the revenge of repressed guilt .
movie news, screening invitations and reviews from the world of independent film and beyond .
“ martyrs ” is only eighty minutes long, sans credits, yet still it manages to cram four bad horror films into its meager runtime. a remake of 2008’s french torture porn / cult horror flick with the same title, the original “martyrs” was by no means a masterpiece, but managed to be extremely effective during its third act, thanks mainly to writer / director pascal laugier ’s staunch dedication to medieval - level gruesomeness mixed with an intensely grim existential hopelessness .
ms. ponder said she hoped any attention given the new “martyrs” would work in favor of the old, a film she has been unable to shake — to horror fans, a badge of honor .
the weinstein company bought “martyrs” following its premiere in 2008 at cannes, where it incited walkouts. it was never released theatrically in the united states. (in an interview with the horror website shock till you drop, mr. laugier said the producer bob weinstein “tried to watch ‘martyrs’ in the plane back from cannes and couldn’t stand its violence. ”) in france, it was originally given the equivalent of an american nc - 17, later lowered to the equivalent of an r .
but it’s worth remembering that the first reviews of martyrs weren’t that all that complimentary either – for the exact opposite reasons .
and certainly, as an example of the new french extreme, this film is perfect .
your brain is broken. this film and most of life in general is beyond you .
a scene from the movie
martyrs
of bailey noble who plays anna. (anchor bay entertainment / anchor bay entertainment )
the sadistically torturous 2008 film had been rumored for a remake since it was first released, and has now reportedly entered the post - production phase after being filmed in secret. according to the report, kevin and michael goetz (scenic route) have already wrapped the filming process with bailey noble (true blood) and troian bellisario (pretty little liars) starring in the lead roles. the film is produced by blumhouse productions and the safran company .
shatteringly stupid and repulsively misogynistic ,
martyrs
mashes revenge, torture and the supernatural into one solid, quasi - religious lump .
for thoughts on, and a place to discuss, plot details we can’t reveal in this review, visit martyrs ’ spoiler space .
now — despite my enthusiasm for the film, i can definitely say that it is not one to recommend. in terms of impact the film has, this probably sits just below a serbian film. it’s a really, really good movie, but it’s a full - on sucker punch of a film. it kind of leaves you reeling, because a movie has rarely been so cruel .
based on the brutal 2008 french canadian philosophical thriller written and directed by pascal laugier, remaking a movie for american audiences that has a fan base as loyal as martyrs is a bold move. directors (and brothers) kevin and michael goetz tackle this difficult challenge by toning back on the violence, altering the lifespan of some of the characters, and focusing mostly on the lifelong friendship between anna and lucie .
troian bellisario and bailey noble in a scene from the film by the directors kevin and michael goetz .
yes i do agree it’s a “hugely” graphic film but after watching “earthling” the gore / torture (s) of “martyrs” is nothing because you know it’s not true & just acting. “earthling” has scarred me and will for ever be traumatized .
martyrs opens in select theaters on january 22nd, 2016 and will be available on dvd and blu - ray on february 2nd, 2016 .
there are movies that you can call violent, unsettling, shocking, disturbing, stomach - churning, depressing or demented and then, there is martyrs. proudly presented by the new french extremity movement, notable for films like high tension, inside & irreversible, martyrs sets an incredibly high bar for ensuing films of its genre and is arguably the most extreme & harrowing film ever made .
both the french and u. s. iterations of
martyrs
are transparently voyeuristic cheaply ginned - up guignol peep shows with intellectual pretensions .
since its debut at the cannes film festival last summer, martyrs has had tongues wagging furiously over its graphic content, its persistent and excessive violence, its apparent misogynistic tendencies and its supposedly sadistic preoccupations, and certainly, for these reasons and many others, martyrs isn’t for everyone. however, for those brave enough to enter pascal laugier’s bad, bad world, there’s a balls - achingly brutal horror film waiting to be experienced; one that’s deeply disturbing, profoundly moving and somehow, eerily beautiful .
mr. couzens, your excellent, ahem, dissection of the film’s plotting and theme gives great insight .
the final shot of the film saw chris troubled, standing apart and very disconnected from his happy family .
brigid cherry, “refusing to refuse to look, ” the horror film reader, 169 - 170. ↩
brutal from start to finish and ruthless in its depiction of despair, pascal laugier’s 2008 french - language shocker is an endurance test for even the most tenacious try - me horror fan. the critic simon abrams wrote that the film “takes the underlying concept of torture porn — pleasure from excessive displays of pain — and thoroughly explodes it in 99 minutes of grueling, nonstop butchery. ” and that was a rave .
an aging porn star agrees to participate in an
art film
in order to make a clean break from the business, only to discover that he has been drafted into making a pedophilia and necrophilia themed snuff film .
martyrs 2015 is not a particularly good film, but it is a decently made one, although it has an oddly incongruous warm look to much of the cinematography which makes its low budget more apparent and at times makes it look like a basic cable tv movie .
the film begins with a young girl running away from an industrial complex, panicked and bloodied. and by young i mean about 12 years old, if not less. this is 57 seconds into the film, and we already know we’re in an edgier film than most. she runs away, limping and screaming. this is lucie .
brutally well - conceived... for about 40 minutes, and then
martyrs
flips on its own bloody axis and falls apart, existentially .
roger ebert, the patron saint of many a film lover, was well known for being fundamentally inclined against a certain stripe of horror film. not against horror of the classical or psychological variety— the bride of frankenstein, psycho, and rosemary’s baby were not objects of his disdain. not even, necessarily, against modern or graphic horror—his great movies series included films such as se7en, alien, and the shining. but many horror films faced an uphill battle with ebert, who called the texas chain saw massacre “an effective production in the service of an unnecessary movie. ” one can only imagine what he might have said about martyrs, pascal laugier’s 2008 deposit at farthest end of the new french…
crew: camera (color), nathalie moliavko - visotzky, stephane martin; editor, sebastien prangere; music, seppuku paradigm; production designer, jean - andre carriere; costume designer, claire nadon. reviewed at ugc cine cite les halles 3, paris, sept. 6, 2008. (in fantasy filmfest, germany; frightfest, london; toronto film festival - - midnight madness .) running time: 99 min .
film should score ok with hardcore gore fans, but others will expect martyrdom for sticking it out until the end .
it' s a hollow film with hopelessly annoying themes that don' t arouse questions so much as eye rolls .
excellent analysis. i just watched the film for the first time and needed something to ground all that depravity in .
while the film is hardly a lifetime movie, the brothers goetz might not necessarily disagree with ms. hayes that their film will appeal to women. “when you use the word ‘hope’ with the word ‘martyrs, ’” it makes people livid, kevin goetz said. “but this film and this screenplay have a glimmer of hope in the fact that these two women will do whatever it takes to survive. ” michael goetz added, “at all the screenings we’ve had so far, women have reacted very well. ”
martyrs is an intense french film about the physical and psychological hell some people endure, and the revelations that can come from such trauma. it' s a highly singular, inspired, ultraviolent film and horror fans everywhere love it, so of course hollywood wanted a remake. hot on the heels of the last exorcism in 2010, director daniel stamm ended up landing the highly coveted gig .
like house of voices, the €2. 8m martyrs was produced by richard grandpierre for eskwad and will have an eight - to ten - week shoot in canada .
hi, i thoroughly enjoyed your analysis of martyrs and included a link to your review in a list of martyr - related websites on my subreddit called cinematic trauma .
writes about comics, books and movies for the comics journal, the l magazine, the new york press and slant magazine. since last year, he’s been obsessively keeping a film journal where he writes down something about every film he’s seen .
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was this a horror film? at no point was i scared, i was only ever depressed or disgusted. which isn' t to say it was intended to scare, i think pascal laugier made martyrs to create these feelings of depression and disgust. so in a way it succeeded .
the tomatometer score — based on the opinions of hundreds of film and television critics — is a trusted measurement of critical recommendation for millions of fans. it represents the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or television show .
thanks to bloody regular fabien m. , we have also learned that martyrs, which is to be produced by blumhouse and the safran company, has already been completed .
considering that “martyrs” was a fairly low budget production that was shot in twenty days, the lush cinematography by sean o’dea is impressive, especially during a gorgeous tracking shot of a candle - lit church. but it’s the wrong look for a movie with such grim and bleak subject matter. the grimy and grainy look of the original was far more fitting. if you’ve never seen the 2008 version, a proud member of the new french extremity movement, i guess the many twists and turns of the new “martyrs” might engross you in a fairly superficial way. but why bother with a muted copy, when you can experience the balls - to - the - wall original? [ d ]
some viewers saw it when it premiered at cannes in 2008 – one of the most controversial films to hit the festival since gaspar noé’s irreversible – while others caught it later that year at london’s frightfest. others first heard about it through word of mouth – through reports of audiences fainting in the aisles and vomiting after watching its scenes of extreme torture .
[ note: heather had actually suffered a mis - carriage, a fact that roy learned only later in the film. ]
film selections have varied but have included black christmas (1974), the hills have eyes (1977), the hunger (1983), the texas chainsaw massacre (1974), the texas chainsaw massacre 2 (1986), the stepford wives (1975), teeth (2007), rabid (1977), the brood (1978), let the right one in (2008), ginger snaps (2000), jenifer (2005), sick girl (2006), fido (2006), dawn of the dead (1978), day of the dead (1985), near dark (1987), audition (1999), tokyo gore police (2008), in my skin (2002), braindead / dead - alive (1992), martyrs (2008) and american mary (2012). these films feature strong, non - normative or monstrous female characters. they raise feminist issues such as sexism, menstruation, pregnancy, motherhood, abortion, rape, gender trouble, and the gendered, raced or classed mapping of the body. they may contain final girls. they range from comical to disturbing, from slower to fast - paced, from conventional horror to “postmodern” and from less gore to more. equipped with feminist theories, students become deeply absorbed in these films while maintaining an enjoyable engagement .
the problem with extreme cinema is finding the balance between extremity, context and story – on one end you’ve got a film that’s really great but confronts an audience a little too much (irreversible) or on the other, a film that’s so concerned with being extreme it forgets to have a story, or in the end confront its audience too much (the human centipede). but somewhere in the middle lies martyrs, a film that, in terms of content is probably more extreme than a serbian film or irreversible – but in execution takes that content, wraps it up in one hell of a mystery and metres out its extremity over the course of one solidly good movie .
( 2004), the main character is called anna jurin. in martyrs, anna is one of the female leads' character names, whilst lucie jurin is the other .
some authors have speculated that martyrs– like other french horror films of the past 20 years, such as xavier gens’s frontiers – deliberately evokes deep - set trauma from france’s past .
the film took in about $ 1 million globally before moving to dvd in 2009. it has drawn fans ever since. featured on the covers of the horror magazines fangoria and rue morgue, it’s a film devotees know about even if they haven’t seen it .
unfortunately, in goosing the momentum, the creators of the film have lost the soul of what was essential to this horrific tale .
first of all, great article! martyrs is one of those films that really stays with you. it is physically affecting, watching the creatures painfully move around and anna withstanding her torture. unlike hostel or a serbian film though the torture is not for anybody else’s pleasure but for anna’s own transcendence into martyrdom .
so it’s no surprise that the film’s partisans are wary of a new “martyrs, ” which opened jan. 22. one of the film’s backers is blumhouse, the red - hot production company behind the popular but hardly hard - core horror franchises “paranormal activity” and “insidious. ” as with recent remakes of “halloween” and “the evil dead, ” fans of the original are wringing their hands over an american remake that might water down carnage or sanitize content .
it’s hard to ignore the undercurrent of misogyny in the third act, but martyrs is arguably a modern horror classic from the new french extremity movement. if you’re cool with extremely disturbing gore and violence then check it out! if not, i recommend staying at least 300 feet away from this film at all times .
in all of the reviews i have seen of this film, no - one, not one has understood why mademoiselle removes her wig, head - scarf and make - up at the very end of the film before saying, “keep doubting” and blowing her brains out .
eight years ago, the horror community was electrified – a term that implies both a shock and an excited, skin - prickling awakening – by the release of a resolutely bleak french - language film named martyrs. directed by the hitherto obscure pascal laugier and starring unknown actresses morjana alaoui and mylène jampanoï, the film, a low - budget french - canadian production made for just under three million euros, quickly began to assert its place in horror movie history .
there really was only one possible ending for the film and that’s the one we were given, regardless of how unsatisfying. if madam. had lived to relate anna’s experience, the film maker would have had to speculate on the nature of the afterlife of which he clearly has no better idea than we do. any imagination he might exert would bring the film into the genre of fantasy or pseudo - mystical rather than horror .
he' solved' his wife' s rape / murder - again - by killing
teddy
- the film' s opening sequence .
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great article! i’m not sure if i have the stomach to seek out the film, but your words will definitely stick with me for a while after reading your piece, much like it seems the film has stuck with you. something to think about certainly – the glorification of violence .
perhaps this is the point. we, like anna, must earn the revelation the film offers us. the film hasn’t offered us cheap visceral thrills, but a contemplative treatise on how we think of violence. the victim, the sufferer, is no longer disempowered, but may be the most spiritually powerful being possible. as an audience we are invited to suffer rather than enjoy the cheap, visceral thrills of another torture porn film .
martyrs is a film that has never left me, that i was unsure if i was enjoying or not until indeed my mouth was open for the entirety of the second half. it certainly separates itself from other films within the torture porn sub - genre, as it attempts to justify the heavy visual elements of its plot – and i believe does so extraordinarily well. i’d agree with your observations of the film and its place within french extremism, but i think at times the creators weren’t seeking to make as much meaning as we can derive. there are some parts of the film there for shock and gore, left suitably unsubstantiated .
yes, martyrs – which tells the story of a young woman (lucie, played by jampanoï) who tracks down the people responsible for torturing her as young child – is notoriously difficult to watch .
the kind of person who' d be inclined to seek the film out is probably not the kind of person who' d regret that decision .
linda williams, “when the woman looks” in the horror film reader, ed. mark jancovich (london: routledge, 2001), 61. ↩
carol clover men, women and chainsaws: gender in the modern horror film (princeton, nj: princeton up, 1992), 53. ↩
: martyrs are exceptional people. they survive pain, they survive total deprivation. they bear all the sins of the earth. they give themselves up. they transcend themselves... they are transfigured .
the fact that there is now a remake of martyrs is no surprise, laugier sold the remake rights as soon as his film got international release. the surprise is that, after several years of development hell, blumhouse productions, the safran company, and directors kevin and michael goetz (scenic route) managed to shoot the low budget remake in total secrecy. we didn' t know about it until it was already in the can. this weekend, it will be released into the world to answer the question ,
how can you possibly remake martyrs ?
the ballad of narayama
is a japanese film of great beauty and elegant artifice, telling a story of startling cruelty. what a space it opens…
i really liked this film, i found it incredibly disturbing and i don' t think that it was an effective horror film, more of a psychological thriller. i did really enjoy it and i would recommend it to anyone who likes horror films, but it is not for the faint of heart .
very interesting dissection of martyrs! i’ve seen a smattering of new french extremity, but this film i’ve struggled with for a while. i love the first half, the comfortable familiar narrative, as you described; i assumed that lucie was unhinged on my first viewing and didn’t want her to be correct in her assumption about the family she killed being her torturers .
martyrs are exceptional people. they survive pain, they survive total deprivation. they bear all the sins of the earth. they give themselves up. they transcend themselves... they are transfigured .
the story in the remake looks more or less the same: a young lady seeks revenge against those who tortured her as a child. this isn’t a red - band trailer, so either there’s a lot this trailer isn’t showing or they made a pg - 13 version of martyrs. pg - 13 or not, though, there was never a chance the american version of martyrs would be half as violent as the original .
very detailed article on an astonishing horror film. a friend asked if i would recommend it, and i gave him a resounding yes. excellent work here .
the men in black of the film' s title originally referred to a sci - fi comic book series, first published in 1991, about a top - secret organization of agents that monitored, regulated and policed paranormal and alien activity on earth. there were two film sequels to the 1997 release, in 2002 and 2012 .
continuing the trend in 21st century french extremism (following the likes of xavier gens ’ frontiere (s) (2007) and alexandre bustillo and julien maury’s inside (2007) ), pascal laugier’s martyrs raises the bar even higher by offering a nauseating, ruthless indictment of and reflection on the violence, hatred and pain that fuels our modern day world. cheery, this film is not .
although american audiences have their fair share of bloody fanatics, martyrs has to date only managed a small cult following due to its highly graphic nature. the film is a risky choice for any studio to tackle. depending on the mpaa rating, we will soon know how extreme the studios are willing to take it. this is one horror flick to watch out for as the news progresses .
the film takes you through a journey, first depicting shocking violence with an understandable but morally questionable motive, moving to the visceral, torturous aftermath of violence with no motive, though committed against a figure that is slightly removed from the audience. it is only in the final third of the film that its raison d’être is revealed .
unfortunately, reeling in that younger target audience means sacrificing much of the exaggerated, disturbing material, resulting in a lack of the vicious grit that made the original so iconic. mostly though, aside from creating a much tamer version, the 2015 martyrs headed by the goetz brothers feels too similar to the first film, bordering on a shot - for - shot remake that doesn’t really bring anything new or worthwhile to the table in order to justify its existence. overall, this is a decent film, but it’s not much more than that. hopefully, this depiction will arouse curiosity for the much harsher original, and encourage fans to seek out the french cult classic, which sadly, proves to be a much impactful film .
mademoiselle: martyrs are exceptional people. they survive pain, they survive total deprivation. they bear all the sins of the earth. they give themselves up. they transcend themselves... they are transfigured. see more »
this is almost as bad as david gordon green declaring that he would remake suspiria into
some classy shiat
rather than a
low budget italian gore film
.
, then you’re in for a trip when the u. s. remake hits theaters. the original french language film is the most notorious entry in a radical shift of
featuring morjane alaoui (marock) and mylene jampanoi (valley of flowers), martyrs promises to be an indulgent journey into the heart of darkness of a human soul, set against the backdrop of child kidnapping, torture and revenge .
martyrs is a groundbreaking work - it challenges the audience to endure heinous acts yet to emerge spiritually cleansed; to witness man' s willingness to abuse, degrade and manipulate, yet leave the theatre more enamoured with humanity than ever .
citing the slasher antagonist of “friday the 13th, ” stacie ponder, the writer of the horror - themed blog final girl and author of a coming monograph on “martyrs, ” said: “in your typical horror movie, when jason punches somebody’s head off, you might laugh or get a thrill. there are no thrills in ‘martyrs. ’ it’s about the pain, not the torture. there’s no space between us and the pain that these characters are enduring. ”
i would beg to differ with the review of this film - it seems that most of the uk press have missed the point of this film. it' s deeply complex and amazing to watch. everyone i know that has seen it and understood it (most people - but clearly not the press) has been deeply moved and amazed .
but the cruelty of the film is a bit like the torturers themselves; it’s not malicious. it’s not a film trying to shock you and repulse you, like any number of torture - porn films of the current ilk, an obvious case being hostel or a more obvious example in the malignant a serbian film. its cruelty is naturally derived from the intensity of the story; toning the violence down would make the mystery in the story less effective. it’s full on, but it’s contextual, and never exploitative .
remaking a film that reigns as one of the most disturbing ever would challenge any director. the original “martyrs” begins as a home invasion film, as lucie and anna, young women who met as children at an orphanage, seek revenge on the family that imprisoned and tortured one of them 15 years ago. but as their plan takes a merciless turn, anna plummets into a world dominated by a shadowy organization with bloodthirsty ideas about divine suffering. in one bloodcurdling scene anna is immobilized and her back is flayed; the camera lingers on her face as she reacts to the pain .
both narratives played separately and alternately until the film' s climactic conclusion when the two strands merged into a color sequence - at the time of the strangulation of jimmy grantz .
time to take the cenobites serious again. not a fan of remakes but i think hellraiser is a perfect candidate for one and laugier can bring a great vision to it. i also loved st. ange. i cant wait for martyrs .
they also point out that the vast majority of women become victims, not martyrs. they succumb to the torture, and die. and, as the creepy mademoiselle makes clear, anna is going to be subjected to all of this now .
technically, the film is also incredible. it’s beautifully shot, which helps make the violence so unpalatable, because it’s contrasted well against the otherwise glossy film. the modern set of the house is also utilised well. it does feel homey when the family are still alive, pre - lucie, but afterwards, it becomes cold and sterile, and torturous .
the film ended with a tear - jerking, fireworks - filled conclusion, set at bill' s 65th birthday party celebration. parrish delivered a heart - warming speech to everyone :
williams, “when women look: a sequel” in freud’s worst nightmares, accessed online at urltoken. see also williams, “learning to scream” in the horror film reader, 168. ↩
i watched the film but i would have to agree with katie. if you need food for thought this film is a bad excuse. plato is sure better. the only challenging intellectual puzzle is at the end and it’s not that good. and you know that all these justifications are only there for the shock value so the director can get a little attention .
martyrs is a movie of three acts, which makes it both difficult to summarise (without spoiling the experience) and categorise. the dizzying, nauseating and frenetic pace of the first two - thirds of the film creates a remarkable intensity thanks to the unflinching violence and fierce music score. indeed, the narrative becomes so disorientating, that we’re never quite sure what kind of genre flick we are watching and what direction it will take .
kevin and michael goetz, the brothers who directed the new “martyrs, ” say they understand fans’ apprehension. but their job was “to focus on the script that was given to us, ” kevin goetz said. their hope is that their reimagining, as they call the version written by mark l. smith, a co - writer of “the revenant, ” will shine a light on a film still largely under the public radar .
mademoiselle believed they could discover the secrets of the afterlife through their experiments by finding a true martyr - a subject who would achieve a state of euphoric transcendence :
martyrs are very rare. a martyr is something else. martyrs are extraordinary beings. they survive pain, they survive total deprivation. they bear all the sins of the earth. they give themselves up, they transcend themselves... they are transfigured. it turns out that women are more responsive to transfiguration. young women .
throughout the course of the film we see lucie suffer gruesome hallucinations and self - mutilate due to past trauma, and witness the bloody massacre of a family of four – children included .
in a film filled with savagery and horror, it’s a moment that shocks to the core: a reminder that unexpected tenderness can be as viscerally, skin - shiveringly affecting as torture .
yes, this is a relentless and disturbing film and certainly not for everyone. i never found it gratuitous, however, which often isn' t the case in films like this .
this much can be said for the new remake of martyrs: it’s efficient. clocking in at under 90 minutes, the film proceeds at a rapid clip, never lingering too long on any one scene, or dragging out a single shot beyond the minimal time needed to achieve its purpose. unfortunately, in goosing the momentum, the creators of the film have lost the soul of what was essential to this horrific tale. indeed, the original movie might be the only film lumped under the banner of “extreme horror” (or, less charitably, “torture porn”) to truly and narratively justify the argument that extending brutal scenes of violence and abuse is the whole point. (the a. v. club previously referred to it as “the torture - porn movie to end all torture - porn movies. ” )
martyrs is very nihilistic... the american approach [ that i' m looking at ] would go through all that darkness but then give a glimmer of hope. you don' t have to shoot yourself when it' s over .
martyrs & high tension, both french are very refreshing to a long time horror buff like myself. seriously r. zombie fliks r total rip offs. nothing new, i guess, us as horrific talented fans should voice our ideas more. (=
when horror fans dare horror rookies to watch a movie, it’s usually a classic frightfest like “the exorcist” or a more recent white - knuckler like “it follows. ” when horror fans dare other horror fans to watch a movie, it’s “ martyrs. ”
you paint such a harrowing picture of this film and this is my second experience with french extremity, irreversible i found to be truly disturbing if you can class it in the same genre .
famed writer / director woody allen' s first r - rated dramatic - erotic thriller, and his first film set and shot in england. the film, without allen' s typical humor, recalled elements of a place in the sun (1951), body heat (1981), fatal attraction (1987), allen' s own crimes and misdemeanors (1989), his future film cassandra' s dream (2007), and similarities to dostoyevsky' s crime and punishment 1866 novel. its main tagline was :
passion, temptation, obsession .
modleski, tania. “the terror of pleasure: the contemporary horror film and postmodern theory” in studies in entertainment: critical approaches to mass culture. (indiana university press), 1986. ↩
certainly one of the smarter horror films to come along in awhile (and leagues above that saw and hostel trash). im not a fan of torture porn but martyrs isnt really a part of that genre. it has an agenda far more significant than simply freaking its viewer out via the graphic violence. it does come across a tad pretentious though in the end. i dont enjoy leaving a film feeling more a test subject than a viewer .
this seems to be the question of the most interest, so let’s get right to it. if you’ve seen the first, or to put it more bluntly, are a huge fan of the first film’s violence; this film will certainly not shock you. the first film pretty much knocked it out of the park with how far you can push torture and pain cinematically: it was literally breathtaking. but for as many people that loved it; it alienated just as many. this version is definitely a bit more accessible graphic - wise: but still pushes boundaries nonetheless .
considering how great his newest movie is, it really is a bummer that we' ll never get to see what daniel stamm would have done with martyrs. 13 sins is one of the smartest remakes i' ve seen in a good while, proving stamm is the kind of director who really understands how to update source material so fans aren' t just getting an identical retread with no identity of its own. we just hope that whoever inherits this new, low - budget version of martyrs has those same instincts .
the goetz brothers (scenic route) have directed the u. s. version of pascal laugier’s 2009 french horror film that challenged religion, and played a cathartic role in his real life loss .
laugier first came to public acclaim in france in 2004 with his debut film house of voices, which went on to have a spectacular success at the spanish box office in the summer of 2005 .
with its story told in reverse, it was challenging in itself just to watch due to its non - linear, backwards narrative structure. a crucial fact about the smoothly - edited film was :
he sells out to blamed, evil hollywood as well by doing a remake to
martyrs
( at least he will be involved with the script and obviously will make a lot of cash with it). so that guy sold out twice. talk about capitalism .
but the biggest achievement of the film is most certainly its two leads. i’ve read reviews accusing the characters of being one - note, but that’s ridiculous. these girls are frightened, traumatised, panicked and heart - racing the entire time they’re on screen. acting those emotions for the length of time it takes to shoot a film is an incredible feat, especially because they do it so convincingly .
and reconsider their position. this isn’t my way of chastising people with different opinions than myself but rather my way of saying: “this film is a good example of what’s wrong with the term. ”
[ note: at the end of the film ,
teddy
equated leonard with sammy jankis :
sammy didn' t have a wife. it was your wife who had diabetes .
]
like the worst real - world monsters (josef mengele is the obvious example), the movie’s torturers, whose true motivation is revealed in the final act, are also convinced that they’re doing the right thing. they see themselves as experimenters, explorers, brave pioneers – and, disturbingly, martyrs manages to temporarily put its audience into their blood - stained shoes. even as we wince for the film’s victims, we find ourselves simultaneously desperate to know what their abusers will uncover .
martyrs is very nihilistic ,
he told 24 frames .
the american approach [ that i' m looking at ] would go through all that darkness but then give a glimmer of hope. you don' t have to shoot yourself when it' s over .
and when it comes to
barking up the wrong tree :
um, no. if people can analyze symbols and structure of an art film, i don'; t see why the horror film should be off limits. so perhaps you should go read something else if you think that my writing is a waste of time. posted by simon abrams on 2009 - 11 - 14 17: 54: 46
and martyrs’s final section, which focuses on lucie’s friend and would - be lover anna (alaoui), is almost entirely composed of sustained, dispassionately clinical scenes of torture – all of which build to a famously grim conclusion (game of thrones villain ramsay bolton would probably approve) .
smith and the goetzes have taken liberties with laugier' s plot, shuffling the order of events and changing which characters live or die. and while the violence is relentless in the final third of the new
martyrs ,
it' s much less explicit than the french version .
for a film that' s really personal such as this, it' s far better for yourself to decipher these things on your own. no one gets any meaning or learns from art through asking
what is it
, but a different method would be pure discussion from the basic philosophy of the film, something in which you can derive your own personal meaning from instead of being given an answer. just sayin
laura mulvey, “visual pleasure and narrative cinema” in film theory and criticism: introductory readings, eds. leo braudy and marshall cohen. new york: oxford up, 1999: 833 - 44, 837. ↩
fans of the original will probably see it as fairly pointless, but when you’re plugged into the horror community, it’s easy to forget that most people have never seen the french martyrs. whether it be the fact that they couldn’t track down a copy, they heard about the gratuitous violence and decided to avoid it, or, probably most likely, they just didn’t want to read subtitles, many people have never been exposed to the 2008 nihilistic genre mash up that combined three sub genres into one: supernatural, home invasion, and horrifying torture porn. in fact, removing some of the more abusive moments from the feature may actually play out well, with blumhouse now announced to produce, sticking to the bare minimum plot points while holding back on the barbaric antics will attract just the kind of crowds they’re looking for — young adults who have never seen the original .
ultimately, horror movies can frighten us in lots of different ways, combining their inherent darkness with sly humour, adrenalin - fuelled scares, or with painterly splashes of gore. but martyrs is a rare creation: a 21 st - century film that subtly elicits all the sorrow of the preceding century, imbues its scenes of torture with a sense of vivid, heart - breaking pity, and forces us to really feel. is it painful to watch? very much so. but worth the suffering? absolutely .
the original french film, written and directed by pascal laugier, has attained cult status as one of the most grueling and upsetting of the recent era of horror cinema that nonetheless deserves critical plaudits—more audition than a serbian film, in short. laugier is a provocateur with a fondness for narrative twists coupled with weighty political and philosophical themes, as demonstrated (to solid but lesser effect) in both his debut house of voices and more recent english - language thriller the tall man. his martyrs is in part an endurance test, a film that dares you to look away from its disgusting images even as it invites you to grapple with a story in which suffering plays a pivotal role. in reworking it for the no - subtitles english audience, that element of endurance is gone, and with it, the gut - punch of an ending which felt so earned is excised, in order to hurriedly wrap up a plot that now feels more trashy than weighty.
martyrs is a 2008 french-canadian drama horror film written and directed by pascal laugier . it was first screened during the 2008 cannes film festival at the marché du film , and the film 's french release was on 3 september 2008 . the american rights for the film were purchased by the weinstein company and the company was responsible for the release of the dvd in april 2009 . the film was controversial upon its release , receiving polarizing reviews from critics and has been associated with the new french extremity movement . 
martyrs is a 2008 french-canadian drama horror film written and directed by pascal laugier. it was first screened during the 2008 cannes film festival at the marché du film, and the film's french release was on 3 september 2008. the american rights for the film were purchased by the weinstein company and the company was responsible for the release of the dvd in april 2009. the film was controversial upon its release, receiving polarizing reviews from critics and has been associated with the new french extremity movement.
martyrs is a 2008 french-canadian drama horror film written and directed by pascal laugier. it was first screened during the 2008 cannes film festival at the marché du film, and the film's french release was on 3 september 2008. the american rights for the film were purchased by the weinstein company and the company was responsible for the release of the dvd in april 2009. the film was controversial upon its release, receiving polarizing reviews from critics and has been associated with the new french extremity movement.