Extreme High Tension

I was talking with Paul Metcalf who runs The Pissed off Geek about High Tension the other night and we were discussing the brutality of the film, and that was my third or fourth viewing of the movie. This was something that I noticed the first time that I saw it, the brutality and the gore that I saw was so intense that captivated me and took me away from the plot a little… but I still loved the movie. I enjoyed the twist and on this viewing I saw some of the plot holes but I want to discuss the brutality a little bit.

For me, I guess the one scene that I found as a shocker was the ending when the ‘killer’ takes a buzz saw and jumps on a car and shreds apart the window as ‘he’ makes his way towards the driver. Its ridiculously gory and blood is spraying everywhere, the screaming won’t stop, the noise is ear piercing and I never expected it to get this gory. When you see the character of Alex getting sprayed with another man’s blood as is unable to get out of the car, you have to feel sorry for this poor girl. She has been through so much and this is the icing on the brutal birthday cake. Hell, I think this scene actually became one of the more famous kill scenes in horror history.

What does this prove exactly? Well, first off, it’s proof that Alexandre Aja is one sick twisted son of a bitch who knows how to keep you captivated in a story. However, it also proves that the Unites States are not the only ones that know the ropes of a good splatter flick, that the French are making a name for themselves in the horror industry with extremely intense and gory movies. Even with the decapitation scene in the beginning, the murders only heighten and when Marie wraps the barb wire around the wooden pole and beats the killer in the face with it, I knew right away that there was going to be a bloody finish… and boy was I right.