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Media
Information Box |
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| Released:
2003, 2005 Directed by: Alexandre Aja Written by: Alexandre Aja, Grégory Levasseur Genre: Crime/Horror/Thriller Rated: R Runtime: 91 minutes Country: France Review by: Toni |
| Review Type: MOVIE | |||
Description: Two female students, Marie and Alex, set off to Alex's parent's secluded homestead in the country to relax and study. Come nightfall, Hell pulls up at the front door. Alex is now bound and gagged, taken off, with Marie eluding the intruder. Can she save her friend's life in time? Or is everything all that it seems... Review: Lions Gate Films decided to import a French thriller known as Haute Tension to the United States. Big mistake. This movie is horrible. I am writing this review based on an early viewing of the film and strongly discourage watching this abhorrent travesty of a mistake. Basically, the movie makes zero sense. Many of the problems with this movie are apparent from the beginning. Technical issues, for starters. The dialogue track alternates between poor quality English dub and Subtitled French. I can't figure out why LGF didn't just leave the entire movie in French (there wasn't much worth-while dialogue anyway). The musical soundtrack is completely inappropriate for a horror/thriller type film. Many of the more nonsensical scenes are further unhinged by the ridiculous music. Who masturbates to reggae? The title would lead the audience to believe that the movie is very "intense" but most of the scenes are unintentionally comical, confusing, or just plain boring. The acting is strained and poorly executed. The advertisements and trailers for this movie imply that a potential victim fights back against a serial killer. Seems like a strong female role kicks butt against a villain, right? Not the case exactly. The movie tries desperately to be intelligent and intriguing but never gains momentum and ends without explaining away the blatant inconsistencies. It starts slow. Two friends are spending some off-time with one of the girl's family, apparently out in the middle of nowhere. This is a European film. Europe ranks number one in regards to cell phone penetration (Europe, then Japan and the USA). Therefore, the lack of cell phones or even regular working telephones in this movie is unbelievable. Similarly, the police cannot trace emergency phone calls in France? Another reason never to live in France. Aside from the snooze-inducing qualities of this tripe, the forced deus ex machina style conclusion is so utterly abstruse and illogical your head will literally hurt. Not to spoil the alleged "plot twist," movies like the 6th Sense, Fight Club, Frailty, Perfect Blue and Raising Cain did this much better. Alexandre Aja is a talentless hack that wrote and directed perhaps the worst movie I have ever seen. Marie, the main character, is played by the insufferably annoying Cécile De France. Where is the motive in all this? Thoroughly lost in an exhaustively impregnable mess of scenes that do not make sense. Stay the hell away from this crap. The movie theatre may be able to reimburse your money but no one can reimburse your time. |
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Final
Grade: F- |
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