Martyrs hits differently after the Epstein revelations. Now its depiction of a secret society of wealthy sickos getting away with horrifying crimes hits too close to home. Yes, there have been several such films dealing with underground organizations, usually as mere plot devices. Almost all were labeled “tortured porn” to dismiss their value. Martyrs, however, is more in the vein of Funny Games than a Saw film. More Straw Dogs than The Human Centipede. It’s such an electric piece of entertainment, I wonder how its director ultimately ended up making a film starring Jessica Biel, the Avril Lavinge of cinema.
First, a disclaimer: some may call shenanigans on my praise here due to my distaste for movies such as Haute Tension, a similar “New French Extremity” (a classification I find nearly as idiotic as “torture porn”). I’ve also made it known that I prefer fun gore to the realistic kind. That’s a preference, not the law. I don’t mind a dour movie if it doesn’t take itself more seriously than it deserves. Martyrs is as serious as a heart attack, but it’s well-made and thoughtful enough to earn it. If I had any complaints about its style, it’s that the kinetic camerawork stays so close to its subjects that it’s right on the edge of losing readability. Which is obviously intentional.
In the prologue, little Lucie escapes her kidnappers and ends up in an orphanage where she befriends Anna, a girl roughly the same age. Suffering from extreme PTSD and depression, Lucie finds herself incapable of telling the authorities anything useful. Fifteen years later, an adult Lucie invades the secluded home of the people she believes kidnapped her, armed with a double-barrel shotgun. The result is bloody and unflinchingly brutal. She calls Anna, who secretly loves Lucie, to help her in the aftermath. When it’s revealed there’s an additional threat in the house, you may be thinking to yourself, “Why don’t they just get the hell out of there? Why do they keep going back in?” But the reasons are complex and, halfway through the movie, become utterly obvious. A lesser movie would have saved this explanation as the big twist at the end. This film knows modern audiences are savvy and doesn’t try to hide it.
This is not a film in which women are abused just to exact their revenge for entertainment reasons, à la I Spit On Your Grave (which I would argue is great in its own right). It’s a film in which abuse becomes cyclical and violence begets violence. None of that violence is fantastical. None of it is easy to look at. None of it is fun. Yet the gore never feels gratuitous even though there’s a boatload of it. At any rate, there is a sickness on the screen and it is certainly not for the faint of heart.
There’s nary a bad performance. Even the villains’ farfetched scheme (my least favorite aspect of the movie) is acceptable at best and negligible at worst. I could talk about Martyrs at length, but doing so would necessitate the need for spoilers. I have been very careful not to give away what this movie actually is. You can praise the mainstream appeal of “elevated horror” all you want, but horror will always be at its best when it’s as polarizing and unapologetic as this.
It’s nearly a perfect horror film. I have zero interest in the American remake.
