When you've seen to much .....

A few weeks ago I had the experience of watching MARTYRS directed by Pascal Laugier. 

Now my personal taste in movies does lean to the extreme side of things. Fulci and Ferrara take up a lot of space on my shelves. The cover of NECKROMANTIC will soon be tattooed on my leg  and I can watch CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST while eating pizza. Not much phases me these days in terms of gore. 

However in the last five years, these incredibly mean torture films have been flooding the market. Some I have liked and some I'm rather neutral on .... but something about them continues to bother me. I wasn't able to put a finger on it for a long time. Then I saw MARTYRS.

Before I really get into this let me just say; MARTYRS is an exceptionally made film. It is beautifully shot and extremely well acted. The FX are flawless and Pascal Laugier has much to be proud of. Most people who read this blog will probably like this movie. It was just the end of the line for me personally.

The movie starts out with a young girl, named Anna, chained to a chair. She escapes and finds her way to a orphanage where she befriends another young girl, Lucie. Their adult lives are consumed with finding Anna's absuser and when they do, the movie takes an extreme twist. (Which I will not give away) The combination of the powerful performances given by Morjana Alaoui and Mylene Jampanoi with completely brutal human on human violence made me ill. By the end of the movie I was having an anxiety attack. 

Then it hit me: These movies have no supernatural element. There isn't any real revenge. No moral to the story. No historical basis. Just humans doing horrible things to each other for 2 hours straight. And I've simply had my fill of it.

Do I think these movie are wrong? Of course not. I am a huge advocate of free speech and self expression. These types of films just effect me in a very negative way and I can no longer watch them. For several days afterwards, I found myself super sensitive to any gore or violence. I started to get a little worried ... Had this movie pushed me to far? Was I completely done with all things horror? Would I even be able to do a violent photo shoot again?

Deciding to test myself a couple days ago I chose the Fulci's ZOMBIE. As soon as the classic score started to thumb through my speakers, I was home.  

"I was cured all right" and I haven't  been able to wipe the evil grin off my face since.

STAY DEAD!

Nos