Review #515: 'Martyrs' (2008)

By the start of the 21st century, horror cinema had exhausted the post-modernist referencing of films such as the Scream trilogy (1996 - 2000), or simply settled on a variety of remakes of the ghostly, modernist narratives from Japan (Ringu (1998) for example). After the last decade of the 20th century, which was signified with largely bland cinema, and a political climate focused on the perpetration of sexual deviance, the financial boom of the '90's was still to be revealed as a fallacy, but this extension of capital greed would create an event that would change everything. The attack on the twin towers in New York in 2001, led to a political and media climate of fear. From this fear, the machinations of our political elite were exposed (it was also the first significant decade that unregulated Internet discussion became widespread), with the manufacture of torture on the island prison of Guantanamo Bay. The climate of fear, and the perpetration of US foreign policy on suspected terrorists would inevitably be reflected in cinema - specifically the horror genre.

This trend, set by films such as Saw (2004) and particularly Eli Roth's Hostel (2005) and their sequels, the sub-genre was defined by the journalistic term "torture porn" (or gorenography), and was focused on physical mutilation, torment and bodily endurance. French filmmaker and screenwriter Pascal Laugier took this very conceited concept and managed to create a disturbing, and potentially politically motivated, and gender specific narrative of institutional abuse. After a prologue involving a young girl being manipulated and abused by an unidentified institution, the film portrays an appealing family breakfast, which is quickly intruded upon. A young woman, Lucie (Mylene Jampanoi), bursts into the family property gunning down the 2 point 4 unit. Once she is joined by Anna (Morjana Alaoui), the significance of the murders becomes apparent. This seemingly idyllic family unit hides a dark secret, and these two young women had escaped from their tortuous captors 15 years previously.

Whilst the first part of the film focuses on the revenge of the abused girls, the film alters both thematically and changes the protagonist/spectator relationship. A trick used by Hitchcock in Psycho (1960) when the leading lady, Janet Leigh, is killed off, the audience's identity is with the unstable Lucie. Anna's apparent devotion to Lucie extends to the clean up in the slaughter house. If the first half of the film could be read as a simplistic revenge narrative, with hints of almost delusional character hysteria, then the second part, focused on Anna, forms an incredibly moving and disturbing descent into human suffering and endurance. The secrets that the house hold is tantamount to serious, institutional experimentation.

Before Lucie leaves the film, she is haunted by a twisted and deformed person, the apparition of a girl who attacked her when she was young. But as the house is explored further, the extent of the experiment is revealed. Whilst the perpetrators have moved from their original location, their activities as torturers have moved with them. A basement is set up for the purposes of systematic violence. What becomes apparent is that the experiments perpetrated on young girls is formed by an elite society, looking for answers to fundamental philosophical questions about existence. It is this secretive elite that is reflective of the elitist society that rules the global masses. This society (or global institutions) pursue these transcendental answers with disregard of the masses that they torture. Anna's endurance and levels of abuse, can be transcended  if strong enough, but why would we sacrifice our personal narrative to offer information to our institutions? Like the suspected terrorist held at Guantanamo, can any extracted information be effectively useful.

As Hostel portrayed the "other" (that is the foreigner of America) as twisted, and not civilised like the predominant culture, Martyrs portrays the dominant politics of American foreign policy (and the axis of evil simplification of terrorism), as damaging and personally tragic. It is certainly the most interesting of the "torture porn" films that I have seen, but could easily be interpreted as incredibly misogynist. The elitist "society" group within the film focuses its attentions on women only - the gender whose susceptibility to the experiment is historically "easier", but then, the middle-eastern terrorist would be portrayed in the media as women haters. The male interpretation of their religion places the female as second class, and many of the well publicised "suicide bombers" were women.

A damning indictment of the 21st century's fearsome political climate, but also a thrilling, scary, and often disturbing film. It offers interesting twists, and some gory asides of violence and mutilation, with breathless verisimilitude. The last twenty minutes or so shift in tone, and the audience is witness the full extent of the torture experiment. With the climactic allusions towards Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and references to Hellraiser (1987), it is more rewarding than the average gore film of its ilk. As of November 2010, an American "remake" was announced, but here's hoping that by the time the undoubtedly false starts in production of an English language project, will be completely abandoned. Basically, here's hoping that this torture trend will dissipate, and completely disappear. But than again, will the political and social extremities of our current political milieu be changed before the horror genre trend?


Directed by: Pascal Laugier
Starring: Morjana Alaoui, Mylène Jampanoï, Catherine Bégin
Country: France/Canada

Rating: ****

Marc Ivamy