Martyrs update feed
"You'll be shaking too hard to pick your jaw up off the floor! "
"Often Hated For: Its extreme visceral nature. Reason I Love It: The film is grueling, harrowing, and shocking, that alone sets it apart in a world where art rarely does this. The acting is superb, the villains feasibly menacing, and the journey is nerve-shattering. Much is made about the extreme graphic nature of Martyrs BUT the film has something big to say and the violence, though disturbingly uncomfortable, only makes its final defiant scene all the more impacting. "
"Writer-director Pascal Laugier’s Martyrs leaves you with the scopophilic equivalent of shell shock. The gauntlet that his film’s heroine, a “final girl” who’s abducted and tortured by a religious cult straight out of a Clive Barker novel, is forced to endure is considerable. Which is like saying that King Kong is big, Vincent Price’s performances are campy, and blood is red. Laugier’s film is grueling because there’s no real way to easily get off on images of simulated violence. "