''Martyrs'' is a 2008
psychological horror
Psychological horror is a genre, subgenre of horror fiction, horror and psychological fiction with a particular focus on mental, emotional, and Mental state, psychological states to frighten, disturb, or unsettle its audience. The subgenre frequent ...
film written and directed by
Pascal Laugier
Pascal Laugier (; born 16 October 1971) is a French screenwriter and film director.
Career
Laugier is a former assistant to director Christophe Gans, having directed the "making-of" documentary about Gans' 2001 film, ''Brotherhood of the Wolf' ...
, and starring
Mylène Jampanoï
Mylène Jampanoï (born Lena Jam-Panoï; 12 July 1980) is a French actress, model, and visual artist. Her first leading role was in the drama film '' The Chinese Botanist's Daughters'' (2006). She subsequently garnered international attention f ...
,
Morjana Alaoui
Morjana Alaoui ( ar, مرجانة العلوي; born November 30, 1982) is a Moroccan- French actress. She is best known for her starring roles in director Laila Marrakchi's ''Marock'' and ''Rock the Casbah,'' films which dealt with sexual taboo ...
, and
Catherine Bégin
Catherine Bégin (22 April 1939 – 29 December 2013) was a Canadian actress.
Biography
Catherine Bégin's parents were Quebec sound engineer Lucien Bégin (1895–1964) and Belgian accountant Marie-Louise Vanhavre (or Van Havre) (1906–196 ...
. It follows a young woman's quest to seek revenge against individuals who abducted and tortured her as a child, and her friend, also a victim of abuse, who agrees to help her; their plot, however, leads to the disturbing revelation of a
secret society preoccupied with the creation of "
martyr
A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an externa ...
s" through physical torture.
An international co-production of France and Canada, ''Martyrs'' was filmed in
Montreal
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...
, and screened at the French film market
Marché du Film
The ''Marché du Film'' (french for "Film Market") is one of the largest film markets in the world.[Marc ...](_blank)
in May 2008, where it incited audience walkouts due to its graphic and disturbing content. It was released theatrically in France on 3 September 2008. The film received polarizing reviews from critics, and has been cited by some critics as being part of the
New French Extremity
New French Extremity (New French Extremism or, informally, New French Extreme) is a term coined by ''Artforum'' critic James Quandt for a collection of transgressive films by French directors at the turn of the 21st century. Also available othe ...
movement, an association Laugier denounced.
In 2017, ''
IGN
''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
'' named it one of the best horror films of all time, ranking it number 32 in a list of 100 films,
while ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'' included it in a 2021 list of the greatest horror films of the 21st century.
[
An American-produced ]remake
A remake is a film, television series, video game, song or similar form of entertainment that is based upon and retells the story of an earlier production in the same medium—e.g., a "new version of an existing film". A remake tells the same ...
of the film bearing the same title premiered in 2015.
Plot
In 1971, young Lucie Jurin escapes from a disused slaughterhouse
A slaughterhouse, also called abattoir (), is a facility where animals are slaughtered to provide food. Slaughterhouses supply meat, which then becomes the responsibility of a packaging facility.
Slaughterhouses that produce meat that is no ...
where she has been imprisoned and tortured for more than a year. She is placed in an orphanage
An orphanage is a Residential education, residential institution, total institution or group home, devoted to the Childcare, care of orphans and children who, for various reasons, cannot be cared for by their biological families. The parent ...
, where she befriends Anna Assaoui, who quickly discovers that Lucie believes she is being tormented by a disfigured, demonic woman.
Fifteen years later, in 1986, Lucie bursts into the home of an apparently normal family, the Belfonds — Gabrielle, her husband, and their two teenage children Marie and Antoine — and kills them with a shotgun
A shotgun (also known as a scattergun, or historically as a fowling piece) is a long gun, long-barreled firearm designed to shoot a straight-walled cartridge (firearms), cartridge known as a shotshell, which usually discharges numerous small p ...
. Lucie believes that the parents were involved in her torture as a child. Anna arrives and is horrified by the carnage but ultimately decides to help Lucie clean the crime scene and dispose of the bodies. Anna later discovers Gabrielle alive and tries to help her escape, but Lucie catches them and beats Gabrielle to death with a hammer. Lucie is again attacked by the demonic woman, but Anna only sees Lucie hurting herself; the demonic woman resembles another victim Lucie left behind at the slaughterhouse, and is an ostensible psychological manifestation of Lucie's guilt. Realizing that her act of revenge
Revenge is committing a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance, be it real or perceived. Francis Bacon described revenge as a kind of "wild justice" that "does... offend the law ndputteth the law out of office." Pr ...
has failed to alleviate her mental suffering, Lucie slits her own throat.
The following morning, Anna, while on the phone with her estranged abusive mother, discovers a secret passageway in the home's living room, leading to a subterranean chamber. Imprisoned in it is a horrifically brutalised and emaciated woman, proving Lucie was right about the Belfonds. Anna attempts to help the woman, who is hysterical and nonverbal. Anna removes a steel blindfold that has been stapled to the woman's skull and helps give her a bath, only to later find her mutilating her arm with a knife. A group of people arrive at the house, kill the woman, and capture Anna. The group's leader, identified only as Mademoiselle, explains that they belong to a secret society seeking to discover the secrets of the afterlife
The afterlife (also referred to as life after death) is a purported existence in which the essential part of an individual's identity or their stream of consciousness continues to live after the death of their physical body. The surviving ess ...
through the creation of "martyrs
A martyr (, ''mártys'', "witness", or , ''marturia'', stem , ''martyr-'') is someone who suffers persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, or refusing to renounce or advocate, a religious belief or other cause as demanded by an external ...
". They do this by capturing young women and inflicting on them systematic acts of torture, in the belief that their physical suffering will result in a transcendental insight into the world beyond. So far, the group have only produced "victims" who succumbed to the pain and are unable to speak, but are determined to create martyrs who accept their suffering and report their visions of the afterlife.
Anna becomes the group's latest subject. After a period of being brutally beaten and degraded, she is told that she has progressed further than any other test subject and reached the "final stage." She is flayed
Flaying, also known colloquially as skinning, is a method of slow and painful execution in which skin is removed from the body. Generally, an attempt is made to keep the removed portion of skin intact.
Scope
A dead animal may be flayed when pr ...
alive, a procedure that she survives, and reportedly enters an "ecstatic
Ecstasy () is a subjective experience of total involvement of the subject, with an object of their awareness. In classical Greek literature, it refers to removal of the mind or body "from its normal place of function."
Total involvement with ...
" state. Mademoiselle arrives eagerly, and Anna whispers into her ear. Members of the society then gather at the house to pay veneration
Veneration ( la, veneratio; el, τιμάω ), or veneration of saints, is the act of honoring a saint, a person who has been identified as having a high degree of sanctity or holiness. Angels are shown similar veneration in many religions. Etymo ...
to Anna for her martyrdom, and to hear Mademoiselle's announcement of the groundbreaking testimony. While waiting for Mademoiselle, an assistant asks her from outside her door if what Anna said was clear. She unequivocally confirms and asks him in turn if he can imagine what comes after death. After he says no, Mademoiselle abruptly produces a handgun, tells him to "keep doubting", and kills herself.
An intertitle
In films, an intertitle, also known as a title card, is a piece of filmed, printed text edited into the midst of (i.e., ''inter-'') the photographed action at various points. Intertitles used to convey character dialogue are referred to as "dialo ...
explains that "martyr" is Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
for "witness" and the film ends with a shot of Anna lying catatonic on a table.
Cast
Analysis
Critic Maitland McDonagh
Maitland McDonagh () is an American film critic and the author of several books about cinema.
She is the author of ''Broken Mirrors/Broken Minds: The Dark Dreams of Dario Argento'' (1991) and works of erotic fiction and erotic cinema, as well ...
notes that the film contains the theme of the Roman Catholic
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
notions of saint
In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of Q-D-Š, holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term ''saint'' depends on the context and Christian denomination, denominat ...
hood and martyrdom in its exploration of spiritual transcendence via physical pain.[ Laugier himself stated that he intended to make the film's audience "feel real pain" and to "share it as part of an honest process fcommunion... It was a very Catholic process. I have a very Catholic mind."
The film's graphic violence resulted in its being associated with the ]New French Extremity
New French Extremity (New French Extremism or, informally, New French Extreme) is a term coined by ''Artforum'' critic James Quandt for a collection of transgressive films by French directors at the turn of the 21st century. Also available othe ...
movement, an association Laugier vocally denounced. Literary professor Gwendolyn Audrey Foster similarly challenges the sentiment that ''Martyrs'' belongs in this category, writing that its "nihilism
Nihilism (; ) is a philosophy, or family of views within philosophy, that rejects generally accepted or fundamental aspects of human existence, such as objective truth, knowledge, morality, values, or meaning. The term was popularized by Ivan ...
is complete and impossible to dismiss, making it a far different experience from other extreme horror films", also citing Laugier's statement that the film exists in a world "in which evil triumphed a long time ago". Foster also notes Laugier's intent to force the film's audience to bear witness to the pain of the violence represented, writing that its viewers "become martyrs in a sense".
Production
Development
Writer-director Pascal Laugier
Pascal Laugier (; born 16 October 1971) is a French screenwriter and film director.
Career
Laugier is a former assistant to director Christophe Gans, having directed the "making-of" documentary about Gans' 2001 film, ''Brotherhood of the Wolf' ...
, who had previously made his directorial debut with the supernatural horror film ''Saint Ange
''Saint Ange'', also known as ''House of Voices'', is a 2004 French-Romanian horror film written and directed by Pascal Laugier. It is Laugier's feature film debut.
The film stars Virginie Ledoyen, Catriona MacColl, Lou Doillon, and Dorina L ...
'' (2005), wrote the screenplay for ''Martyrs'' after being inspired by Eli Roth
Eli Raphael Roth (born April 18, 1972) is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, and actor. As a director and producer, he is most closely associated with the horror genre, having directed the films '' Cabin Fever'' (2003) and ''Hoste ...
's ''Hostel
A hostel is a form of low-cost, short-term shared sociable lodging where guests can rent a bed, usually a bunk bed in a dormitory, with shared use of a lounge and sometimes a kitchen. Rooms can be mixed or single-sex and have private or shared b ...
'' (2005), and intended to "make a movie about pain." Laugier stated he was in a severely depressed state at the time of writing the film, and was nearly suicidal.[ Visually, he was partly inspired by ]Carl Theodore Dreyer
Carl Theodor Dreyer (; 3 February 1889 – 20 March 1968), commonly known as Carl Th. Dreyer, was a Danish film director and screenwriter. Widely considered one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, his movies are noted for their emotional aus ...
's ''The Passion of Joan of Arc
''The Passion of Joan of Arc'' (french: link=no, La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc) is a 1928 French silent historical film based on the actual record of the trial of Joan of Arc. The film was directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer and stars Renée Jeanne ...
'' (1928), and based the film's final shot on a still of the dying Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc (french: link=yes, Jeanne d'Arc, translit= an daʁk} ; 1412 – 30 May 1431) is a patron saint of France, honored as a defender of the French nation for her role in the siege of Orléans and her insistence on the coronati ...
(portrayed by Renée Jeanne Falconetti
Renée Jeanne FalconettiBoroson, Warren (April 11, 2006)''Daily Record''. claims: "Her name was Renee Jeanne Falconetti. Her daughter, Helene Falconetti, in a letter to me now in the New York Public Library Theatre Division, states that she does n ...
), an image he pasted to the final page of the screenplay.
On pitching the project, Laugier commented that "the film was rejected by all the big French studios, by a lot of actresses, too. The film was really supported by Canal+
Canal+ (Canal Plus, , meaning 'Channel Plus'; sometimes abbreviated C+ or Canal) is a French premium television channel launched in 1984. It is 100% owned by the Groupe Canal+, which in turn is owned by Vivendi. The channel broadcasts several ki ...
, the only television channel in France that still finances some unusual projects".[
]
Casting
Mylène Jampanoï
Mylène Jampanoï (born Lena Jam-Panoï; 12 July 1980) is a French actress, model, and visual artist. Her first leading role was in the drama film '' The Chinese Botanist's Daughters'' (2006). She subsequently garnered international attention f ...
, who was cast as Lucie, was drawn to the project after being profoundly affected by the screenplay.[ "When I chose this movie, my agent told me maybe it’s not a good choice as an actress," she recalled. "You should maybe start with a comedy! But the script was amazing, really amazing. I knew this would be a film that people would either love or hate".][ ]Morjana Alaoui
Morjana Alaoui ( ar, مرجانة العلوي; born November 30, 1982) is a Moroccan- French actress. She is best known for her starring roles in director Laila Marrakchi's ''Marock'' and ''Rock the Casbah,'' films which dealt with sexual taboo ...
, who was cast as Anna, was also attracted to the project after being impressed by its screenplay: "The first time I read the script, I was just like, ‘Wow. I have to be a part of this.' After Pascal cast me as Anna, I started rereading it and every page I was like, ‘Oh my God. How am I going to do this? I’m gonna die'".[ In preparation for the shoot, Laugier spent two months undertaking rehearsals with Jampanoï and Alaoui.][
]
Filming
Principal photography of ''Martyrs'' took place in Montreal
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...
, Quebec, Canada. Laugier commented that the main difficulty other than the technical issues such as special effect
Special effects (often abbreviated as SFX, F/X or simply FX) are illusions or visual tricks used in the theatre, film, television, video game, amusement park and simulator industries to simulate the imagined events in a story or virtual wor ...
s was to keep the actresses in a heightened emotional state. In order to facilitate this, Laugier kept the two lead actresses isolated from most of the crew.[
Jampanoï recalled that she found the shoot emotionally difficult: "Every night when I went back to my room, I just cried, because I was so physically and psychologically tired. All my scenes are violent."][ Jampanoï also stated that, though she respected Laugier's working style, she found him to be "as short-tempered as me...I have a huge amount of admiration for him... but we did end up clashing".
Production was temporarily halted for over a month after Alaoui fell off a soundstage, breaking several bones in her foot.][
The film's special effects were designed by Benoit Lestang, who died by suicide prior to the film's French theatrical release. The film features a mixture of both practical and digital special effects, some of which were completed with the use of green screen.
]
Release
Controversy and censorship
The film screened at the Marché du Film
The ''Marché du Film'' (french for "Film Market") is one of the largest film markets in the world.[Marc ...](_blank)
film market in Cannes
Cannes ( , , ; oc, Canas) is a city located on the French Riviera. It is a communes of France, commune located in the Alpes-Maritimes departments of France, department, and host city of the annual Cannes Film Festival, Midem, and Cannes Lions I ...
in May 2008, inciting walkouts from some audience members. It was subsequently shown on 19 October 2008 at Montreal's Festival du nouveau cinéma
The Festival du nouveau cinéma or FNC (English: ''Festival of New Cinema'') is an annual independent film festival held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, featuring independent films from around the world. Over 160,000 people attend each year. One of ...
. According to Laugier, a man collapsed during the film's screening at the Sitges Film Festival, and a woman vomited during the film's premiere screening in Toronto.[
In France, the film faced significant controversy amongst the country's film rating system, which was recorded in a documentary titled ''Martyrs vs Cenorship'', directed by Frédéric Ambroisine in June 2008. The French ''Commission de classification des œuvres cinématographiques'' initially rated the film 18+ (unsuitable for children under 18 or forbidden in cinemas for persons under 18), which the producers of the film appealed. As a last resort, the French Society of Film Directors (SRF) asked the ]French ministry of culture
The Ministry of Culture (french: Ministère de la Culture) is the ministry of the Government of France in charge of national museums and the . Its goal is to maintain the French identity through the promotion and protection of the arts (visual, ...
to examine the decision, remarking that "this is the first time a French genre film has been threatened with such a rating". The Union of Film Journalists adopted the same position as the SRF, claiming censorship. The Minister of Culture Christine Albanel
Christine Albanel (born 25 June 1955) is a French politician and civil servant. From May 2007 to June 2009, she was France's Minister for Culture and Communication in François Fillon's government.
Early career
Albanel is agrégé in classica ...
eventually asked the Commission of Classification to change its rating, which was done in July 2008. ''Martyrs'' was finally rated 16+, and released theatrically in France on 3 September 2008.[
Recounting the film's rating controversy, Laugier said:
]The Weinstein Company
The Weinstein Company (usually credited or abbreviated as TWC) was an American independent film studio, founded in New York City by Bob and Harvey Weinstein in March 2005. TWC was one of the largest mini-major film studios in North America prior ...
purchased North American distribution rights to the film following its screening at Cannes, but producer Bob Weinstein
Robert Weinstein (born October 18, 1954) is an American film producer. He is the founder and head of Dimension Films, former co-chairman of Miramax Films and The Weinstein Company, all of which he co-founded with his older brother, Harvey. He ...
was ultimately so revulsed by the film that they chose not to release it.[ The film never received a theatrical release in the United States.][
]
Critical reception
The film was categorized as a new example of new era French horror films akin to ''Inside
Inside may refer to:
* Insider, a member of any group of people of limited number and generally restricted access
Film
* ''Inside'' (1996 film), an American television film directed by Arthur Penn and starring Eric Stoltz
* ''Inside'' (2002 f ...
'' with regard to the level of violence it depicts. According to the review-aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, 64% of 39 critics have given the film a positive review, and an average rating of 6.10 out of 10. The website's critical consensus states, "A real polarising movie, this Gallic torture-porn is graphic, brutal, nasty and gruesome and not to everyone's taste."
Todd Brown of ''Screen Anarchy
Screen Anarchy, previously known as Twitch Film or Twitch, is a Canadian English-language website featuring news and reviews of mainly international, independent and cult films. The website was founded in 2004 by Todd Brown. In addition to films, ...
'' called it "without a doubt the single most divisive film to screen in the Cannes Marché Du Film this year," while Ryan Turek at ShockTillYouDrop said that the film "is the new yard stick against which all forms of extreme genre films should be measured against." The ''Montreal Gazette
The ''Montreal Gazette'', formerly titled ''The Gazette'', is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Three other daily English-language newspapers shuttered at various times during the second half of th ...
''s John Griffin awarded the film a three-and-a-half out of four-star rating, describing it as "a film of almost unspeakable horror and sadism hat
A hat is a head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorporate mecha ...
is also a cleverly controlled exercise in hardcore terror with a real end in mind".[
Critic ]Maitland McDonagh
Maitland McDonagh () is an American film critic and the author of several books about cinema.
She is the author of ''Broken Mirrors/Broken Minds: The Dark Dreams of Dario Argento'' (1991) and works of erotic fiction and erotic cinema, as well ...
wrote that the film "has more than can-you-top-this shocks in mind: For all its brutality, ''Martyrs'' is conspicuously high minded, rooted in the centuries-old notion that spiritual transcendence lies just beyond the horizon of pain... You don't have to be Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
to shudder at Pascal Laugier's ''Martyrs'', but it helps."
Accolades
Home media
Wild Side Video released the film on DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...
in France in 2009. In the United States, Genius Products
Genius Products (also known as Genius Entertainment) was an entertainment company based in Santa Monica, California, United States.
The ''Baby Genius'' line was one of a number of "smart toys" that came out in response to a study book about the ...
released the film in both unrated and R-rated DVD editions in April 2009. The British distributor Optimum Releasing
StudioCanal Limited, operating as StudioCanal (formerly Optimum Releasing), is the official branch of StudioCanal in the British Isles. The company releases many films, including foreign, anime (mostly Studio Ghibli), independent, art, British, ...
issued a Blu-ray edition of the film in the United Kingdom the following month in May 2009, and a Canadian Blu-ray followed in 2010 from Entertainment One Films.
On 16 September 2022, the Australian distributor Umbrella Entertainment
Umbrella Entertainment is an Australian film distribution company that began operating in 2001. It is based in Kew, Victoria.
Umbrella Entertainment manages the theatrical, physical, and digital releases of Australian films, documentaries and a ...
released a limited special edition region-free
A regional lockout (or region coding) is a class of digital rights management preventing the use of a certain product or service, such as multimedia or a hardware device, outside a certain region or territory. A regional lockout may be enforced ...
Blu-ray edition as part of their "Beyond Genres" series.
Remake
In 2008, Laugier confirmed in an interview that he was in the middle of negotiating the rights for ''Martyrs'' to be remade in the United States by director Daniel Stamm
Daniel Stamm (born April 20, 1976, in Hamburg), is a German film filmmaker. He is best known for directing the horror films ''The Last Exorcism'' (2010), ''13 Sins
''13 Sins'' is a 2014 American horror-thriller film directed by Daniel Stamm. Th ...
. The producer attached at the time, who had previously produced ''Twilight
Twilight is light produced by sunlight scattering in the upper atmosphere, when the Sun is below the horizon, which illuminates the lower atmosphere and the Earth's surface. The word twilight can also refer to the periods of time when this il ...
'' (2008), indicated that Kristen Stewart
Kristen Jaymes Stewart (born April 9, 1990) is an American actress. The world's highest-paid actress in 2012, she has received various accolades, including a British Academy Film Award and a César Award, in addition to nominations for an Aca ...
was being sought to star in the film, though her involvement with the project was later denied by Stamm. Stamm said " he original filmis very nihilistic. The American approach hat I'm looking atwould go through all that darkness but then give a glimmer of hope. You don't have to shoot yourself when it's over."
In a 2014 interview, Stamm revealed he had left the project after the budget had been reduced, stating, "I think they're now back to making the movie for like $1 million, really low budget, which I think you could almost do, it's just there's this philosophy in Hollywood that you can never go back budget-wise. As a filmmaker you are judged by that. And then there's also this concept I was unaware of called plateauing, where if you're a filmmaker who makes two movies in the same budget bracket, that becomes your thing. You are the guy for the $3 million movie, and then that's all you do. And so my agents wouldn't let me do the $1 million movie, because then that's it for you, you'll supposedly never get that bigger budget".
In February 2015, the new production companies Blumhouse Productions
Blumhouse Productions (; also known as BH Productions or simply BH) is an American film and television production company founded in 2000 by Jason Blum.
It is known mainly for producing horror films, such as '' Paranormal Activity'', '' Insid ...
and The Safran Company
Peter Safran (born 22 November 1965) is a British-American film producer and manager. He currently serves as the co-chairperson and CEO of DC Studios alongside James Gunn.
Early life
After growing up in the UK, Safran graduated from Princeton Un ...
announced that the film was already filmed and that the Goetz Brothers, Michael and Kevin, had directed. In the leads stars Bailey Noble
Bailey Ann Noble (born October 13, 1990) is an American actress. She played Adilyn Bellefleur, the half- fairy daughter of sheriff Andy Bellefleur, on HBO's vampire drama series ''True Blood'' (2013–2014), and Anna Assaoui in the 2015 remake o ...
, Troian Bellisario
Troian Avery Bellisario (born October 28, 1985) is an American actress. A graduate of the University of Southern California, in 2010, she received her breakthrough role as Spencer Hastings in the Freeform drama series ''Pretty Little Liars'' ( ...
, Kate Burton and Blake Robbins.
When asked about the remake, Laugier responded, “I had a bad contract, I didn't even get paid for it! That's really the only thing I regret in my career: That my name is now associated with such a junk film and I didn't even get a cent for it! I tried to watch it but only got through 20 minutes. It was like watching my mother get raped! Then I stopped. Life is too short. In the American system, a movie like ‘Martyrs’ is just not possible - they saw my movie and then turned it into something completely uninteresting.”
Legacy
Several publications have named ''Martyrs'' one of the greatest horror films of all time: In October 2017, ''IGN
''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
'' ranked it number 32 in a list of 100 films, with critic Marty Sliva writing: "Few horror movies elicit as extreme a physical reaction quite like 2008’s ''Martyrs''... the film transforms into a bizarre religious gore-fest that draws a link between spiritual enlightenment and utterly brutal physical and emotional torture. It’s tough to keep your eyes set on the horrifying images that unfold on-screen, but for those willing to dive into its heady themes, it’s even harder to look away."[
In 2021, '']Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'' also ranked it number 36 in their list of the greatest horror films made in the 21st century.
See also
* List of films featuring home invasions
There is a body of films that feature home invasions. Paula Marantz Cohen says, "Such films reflect an increased fear of the erosion of distinctions between private and public space... These films also reflect a sense that the outside world is mo ...
* New French Extremity
New French Extremity (New French Extremism or, informally, New French Extreme) is a term coined by ''Artforum'' critic James Quandt for a collection of transgressive films by French directors at the turn of the 21st century. Also available othe ...
References
Sources
*
*
*
External links
*
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Martyrs
2008 films
2008 horror films
Canadian films about revenge
Canadian horror films
Canadian independent films
Canadian psychological horror films
Canadian splatter films
French films about revenge
French horror films
French independent films
French splatter films
French psychological horror films
French-language Canadian films
Films directed by Pascal Laugier
Films about child abduction
Films about secret societies
Films set in 1971
Films set in 1986
Films shot in Montreal
Home invasions in film
Human experimentation in fiction
Metaphysical fiction films
Obscenity controversies in film
Religious horror films
Sexual-related controversies in film
Splatterpunk
Torture in films
2000s exploitation films
2000s Canadian films
2000s French films