fine whine

That honor goes to High tension, or as it is known in its native France, Haute tension.

Vive la difference.

Anyone watching it expecting to see something different would likely end up as I did, disappointed and annoyed. At the risk of giving too much away, it's about a woman who brings her friend (who fantasizes about her...) home to meet her family at their country home, and the carnage that begins when a large stranger appears and doesn't let up until the last few moments of the film.

I suppose it's a technical achievement in this day and age of CGI effects to have a film supposedly done all in-camera with splattery, gory fake blood, but that really just makes it a stunt, not something necessarily worth watching. If I were a fan of the genre, I might call it a refreshing return to form, or a sentimental slasher or even some sort of retro masterpiece, except that it's no masterpiece.

Against my better judgement, I'm not going to ruin the ending* but failing that, I don't have much else to say about this movie. It's stylish, but I can't help but see parallels to other movies. The most prominent, though undoubtedly the least intended, is the whole spooky truck bit which seems to be lifted from Jeepers creepers, except that it was a major (driving) force in the plot in that film, and here it fulfills a throwaway cliché, the car chase that would be requisite if it were an action movie. I suppose the slasher genre has its car chases, but I don't recall much gore in Bullitt or (either) Gone in 60 seconds.

Going back, I only have one unanswered question that doesn't make sense (beyond the normal suspension of belief) but I'm not really interested in watching it again to see the subtleties. There are dead people, but this is no Sixth sense.

* Lots of people get killed, in gory fashion, and then, before it's over, there's a twist. Or did I just give it all away?