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Frontier(s)

Today I watched a movie recommended by a friend who knew that I liked (appreciated might be a better word) Martyrs.  Frontiers is a movie about a group of Paris thieves who try to escape to the suburbs and make the common movie mistake of stopping at a hostel.  Hostel was made first and there were some definite torture similarities, but where Hostel makes it a game, Frontiers features the family that kills together, stays together.  It has aspects of Hostel, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and many of the common films today featuring an almost identical plot.  Group of people go to the wrong place.  Girl is last to be hunted.  It's become all too familiar.

The difference with Frontiers is that the bad guys are inherently bad.  They aren't vacationers playing out a sick fantasy.  This, as we see, is their life.  The way people are tortured and killed is truly hard to watch.  Much harder than Hostel.  While the mental anguish isn't as obvious, it's the main character you need to watch.  The movie is roughly 110 minutes, with about 90 of it containing blood.  The single most disturbing scene has none.  It is a simple scene of one girl cutting another girls hair.  I don't think I could ever sit through the movie again, because the reality is, as a whole, it's just as good as Hostel, which isn't saying much, but this one scene, is absolutely riveting. It is so out of character with the tempo of the movie, but in the same fashion is exactly what the movie is about.  The most briliiant part of it is the fact the dialogue is almost entirely one character.

From from as bizarre or tantalizing as Martyrs, it's worth a look.  If not for this one scene alone.  Plus, if you actually liked Hostel, you'll love this.  One warning, I assume you can switch it to dubbed, but it is in French with subtitles.

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