HIGH TENSION
I feel like every third movie I write about at some point I’m like “Let me tell you – this movie is brutal.” But High Tension, let me tell you, it is all caps BRUTAL. This French slasher classic doesn’t shy away from the gore. Do a quick little scroll down to the pic of the lead character, Marie brandishing a concrete saw – which she uses – on a person. It. Is. Le. Brutale. This isn’t exactly surprising when you know that this is directed by Alexandre Aja who also made the not exactly chill The Hills Have Eyes remake.
I don't know if you've ever signed up for the horror streaming service Shudder. There isn't a great selection on there but I took advantage of their 14 day free trial because I wanted to watch High Tension and a couple of movies and then when I unsubscribed after the fortnight they said "Hey, would you like another 30 days free?" And I said, sure, and then I didn't watch anymore movies on there.
There was something off about the cut of High Tension available on Shudder. You couldn't choose to watch it in French with English subtitles, you could only watch the English dubbed version. However, in one or two scenes characters dipped in and out of being dubbed and instead spoke in French.
High Tension follows Marie who is staying with her friend Alex’s family when a crazed killer breaks in, kills Alex’s parents and kidnaps Alex. Marie hides out in the creep’s truck and helps Alex escape.
Can we talk about the twist? Skip this paragraph if you don’t know it, don’t want to know it, or are still waiting to get around to watching this now eighteen-year-old movie. The twist is that Marie is the killer. She's lost her mind and thinks she's saving Alex from a murderer, but she's the murderer. It's a pretty good "Woah, that's crazy!" twist, until you think about it for too long, because there's a scene where Marie is driving a car and being chased by the killer driving a truck and it's hard to do the mental gymnastics to make that work. Is the truck metaphorical? Was that a dream? Do trucks even exist in the real world?
How would I fit into High Tension? Well, it would be a nightmare wherever I landed but I think if I’m going to write myself into this movie I’ll choose to jump into the particular version of the film I watched. If you thought I had trouble with the switching between the English dub and the English subtitles in the movie, you better believe that would be the true living nightmare for me in real life.
IF I WERE IN 'HIGH TENSION' I WOULD: BE HIT WITH AN AXE WHILE MAKING JOKES ABOUT "HOW IF YOU'RE FRENCH SHOULDN'T USE BE USING A GUILLOTINE?"
