Award Tour Vol. 30: Having Sat Through It

So I rented a movie called High Tension from Blockbuster - and by God - I demand retribution. I can think of few movies that have been so poorly thrown together as this one. NOTE: If you haven't seen High Tension, I implore you not to. If you will not heed this warning, but instead insist on killing an hour and 35 minutes of your life (because it's just not worth living), then you should perhaps stop reading from here on - because I'm about to reveal details about the movie (though I would argue that in doing so, I'm doing you a favor).

Let's start with this:

Alexandre Aja
Cécile De France
Maïwenn Le Besco
Philippe Nahon

This is the list of people who star prominently in this cinematic monstrosity that should be ashamed of themselves and condemned mercilessly for their participation (particularly Alexandre who was responsible for bringing this disconntected screenplay to life).

The movie centers around two women, best friends Marie and Alex (Marie being the main character - the story is told exclusively from her perspective). In the movie, they go to the countryside to visit Alex's parents. However, during the night (for no discernible reason) they are attacked by a Homicidal Drifter/Delivery Man whose mission it would seem, is to summarily execute everything moving.

As the story lurches forward, we see that it is the father who ignites this killing spree by inexplicably answering the door when the Delivery Man shows up in front of his house in the dead of night. How he allows the Delivery Man to get the jump on him is almost as absurd as how quickly he is dispatched by the homicidal visitor. He is pummeled effortlessly, has his head shoved between the slats of the stair case, and then has it removed, courtesy of a slow moving desk shoved by the Homicidal Delivery Man (seem unbelievable? It gets worse).

Though he cries aloud for several minutes while fighting against the Delivery Man (and I use the term fighting loosely here as the father was primarily on the receiving end of the exchange), his wife only makes her way down to aid the father after his extreme "hair cut". In addition to her unusually slow reaction time, she further compounds the situation by failing to call the police for help. Apparently, the odds are not sufficiently stacked against her at this point. Going head to head against a Homicidal killer, who has just guillotened her husband - is not challenging enough. No, the degree of difficulty must be higher; she must keep the authorities out of it.

Predictably, she is killed with even less effort than the the father was - and while you are spared the images of her being flayed alive, you are not exempted from the orchestra of death (that's composed primarily of two movements: her screams for help and mercy, and then the macabre gurgling of blood when neither help nor mercy is granted).

In the mean time the two best friends scramble through out the house trying to figure out what's going on (much like you do during most of the movie). In the end, Homicidal Delivery Man slaughters all the family, kidnaps Alex in his van, and goes on an extended killing spree. Marie stows away in the back of the van in hopes to save her friend Alex and to end this mad man's murderous romp - all of which culminates at the Delivery Man's hide out.

It is here that we find out that there is no Delivery Man at all, but in fact it was Marie doing the killing all along.

{insert the sound of a needle being ripped off a record here}

That's right... there is no Delivery Man... Marie is the killer.

This is the plot twist. This is the part where the viewer goes, "wow, I never would have guessed that" - but for ALL the wrong reasons. This is the point where I sit up on my sofa in disbelief saying outloud, "you can-not be serious!!!" a la John McEnroe. This is the point where, around the globe, people who were watching this video stopped their collective discs and hurled them across the room in disgust.

Editors Note: I thought it was interesting that, at the point of the plot twist, even Marie - (the lady in the lead role) - had a hard time believing she was the killer. Ironically, this would represent the one and only time I felt I could identify with the main character.

The gaping hole that has just been ripped in the logic of this story (via the plot twist) is large enough to swallow the Taipei Financial Center length-wise... twice. You mean to tell me that: it is Marie that actually beats the father silly and knocks the top off of his Pez dispenser, that guts the mother like a sand shark, that shot-guns the little brother like a clay pigeon (pull!!!), and slashes the gas station attendant to death? Am I supposed to ignore the fact that while all this was happening she was hiding in a closet? It is an amazing conflict in logic which the movie makes no attempt to resolve.

Further:
Wasn't it Marie who hid in the back of the van with her terrified friend when the Homicidal Delivery Man first kidnapped her and drove off with her from the house? Now I am to understand that while Marie was hiding in the back, she was simultaneously driving the van? Are you kidding me?

Let's dig further (if for no other reason than to reach the 6 foot depth threshold required to bury this film):
Let's reflect on the details surrounding the gas station scene. Marie leaves Alex in the van and attempts to get help when the Homicidal Delivery Man stops to get gas (remember they were in the back together as he drove). However, the gas attendant from whom she sought help is slain by the Delivery Man just before he returns to his van to leave. Marie doesn't have a chance to sneak back in the van, so instead she follows after him in a car commandeered from the gas station.

How it is that she can drive both the van and the car simultaneously is something, that the director decides doesn't need to be addressed. It is left to the viewer to construct a rationale in which, Marie's psychotic break with reality, also allows her to defy generally accepted laws of physics that preclude a person from appearing in two places at one time.

The incredibly laxed attention to detail coupled with the general disregard for a cohesive storyline, overwhelmingly convinces me that Alexandre Aja should be the latest shameful recipient of my recently resurrected "Bammy Award"for inferior work in cinema. Her dereliction of duty at the helm of this project is colossal. She should be ostracized for creating it, the cast should be burned in effigy for starring in it, Lions Gate Films should be boycotted for distributing it, and I should be compensated for having sat through it.

http://www.blockbuster.com/ratings/displayViewReview.action?movieID=152043&channel=Movies&subChannel=sub