MARTYRS
There are some moments in your own personal genre cinema history you never forget. The galvanising shower scene in PSYCHO, the gorgeously lurid Eastmancolor murders in BLOOD AND BLACK LACE, the encroaching hordes in NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, the palpable feeling of dread as THE EXORCIST unfolded and the sheer appalled shock witnessing THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE. Part of being a horror aficionado is trying to recapture those delicious sweat-drenched instances when you knew for certain you would be a die-hard genre fan for life. We all know that’s what we are constantly searching for. And we all know how hard those landmark turning points are to find.
The last time it happened to me was when I took my seat at the (much-missed) Star Cinema in Cannes in May 2008 for the first market screening of Pascal Laugier’s MARTYRS. 99 minutes later I emerged from that showing as a jabbering wreck knowing I had seen something extraordinary, something totally unique and a watershed horror event. I rushed back to our FrightFest Central residence and wrote a huge review for ‘Fangoria’, posted online 24 hours later, because I wanted to be the first to proclaim the latest example of French Extreme Cinema a masterpiece, a shocker of the highest calibre for simultaneously using violent outrage and potent allegory (accent on the gory) to explore the human condition and pose the Big Questions of our time.
In truth, I crossed the line doing that because a gentleman’s agreement was permanently in place meaning you are not supposed to review market screenings. But I was that excited, I didn’t care about any embargo issues. I just wanted to tell the entire world to get ready for the seismic gut-punch to come when the benchmark movie would finally be released - as expected, controversially practically everywhere.
The reaction to that review was immediate. I secured the first post-Cannes screening anywhere for FrightFest in August, beating out Toronto’s Midnight Madness and Laugier contacted me to say thanks for the lavish praise and ensured he would be there to support. And my one vivid memory of the FrightFest screening? Laugier pacing up and down outside the Odeon West End worrying about the reaction. He needn’t have, because it was a resounding talking-point hit, so much so we had a repeat screening at our Halloween event at the ICA Cinema, where we hosted the two fabulous stars, Morjana Alaoui, Mylène Jampanoï.
In my opinion, MARTYRS is the gold standard of Noughties horror, a nightmare of existential terror unafraid to be provocative, offend or disturb to the max and one of the few deserving to be mentioned in the same company as those listed in my opening paragraph. Never have those taboo secrets from the grave held such a morbid fascination or been so clearly etched as in the incomparable MARTYRS.
Alan Jones