Impressions before seeing it
An old friend mentioned this French flick on Facebook (thanks, Aaron!) a little while ago. I looked it up and it sounded interesting, but he warned me about blood, gore, and violence.
How was it?
Yeah, if you can't handle a lot of violence then this definitely isn't your thing. Martyrs is one of those brutal torture movies with a bit of horror thrown in, but it's not really that bad if you've seen violent movies before. I actually found it fascinating in the way that Saw is fascinating; I wanted to see what twisted things would happen next and why. And there isn't really a "why" until maybe the last 20-30 minutes, so for most of the movie it just seems exploitative and needless, but I was okay with that because I've always liked those movies that give you no answers up front.
The acting was solid, though due to the torturous nature it was mostly a lot of crying and screaming. The ending was not what I would have guessed, and I'm not sure I really found the conclusion meaningful or likable, but it was interesting, anyway.
Recommendation
If you can stomach the violence - you'll probably be fine if you could handle the Saw movies - then it's a dark and interesting trip of a film that I suppose is worth watching at least once, though I can't promise you'll find it profound.
