High Tension (18) |Home Ents Review

January 22, 2024January 22, 2024 Colin Dibben

Dir. Alexandre Aja, France, 2003, 91 mins

Cast: Cecile de France, Maiwenn, Philippe Nahon

Review by Colin Dibben

One of the highlights of the New French Extremity movement gets the splendid Second Sight treatment in this 4K UHD and Blu-ray set. Expect unhinged people, crazy tension and gore in equal measure.

Best friends Marie (de France) and Alex (Maiwenn) decide to spend a quiet weekend at Alexia’s parents’ secluded farmhouse. On the night of their arrival, a brutal killer (Nahon) turns the girls’ idyllic getaway into an endless night of horror. When he prepares to drive off in his battered truck with a bound and gagged Alex in the back, Marie’s resilience kicks in: she’ll stop at nothing to protect her friend.

This is the more multiplex end of the New French Extremity movement, which may be less of a movement and more like 10 nasty films from the noughties plus the entire output of Gaspar Noe. Co-writer and director Aja has had a fairly high profile subsequent American career with The Hills Have Eyes, Piranha 3D and Crawl.

This version looks absolutely fabulous: the colours and lighting are standout and raise the film far above its low budget. Noe’s fave actor Philippe Nahon is on unspeakably beastly form as the killer who is too bad to be true and Cecile de France’s physicality is impressive.

I’m not sure the note of tension is sustained throughout, but this is definitely a masterclass in mixing tension and gore. The righteous gore comes at just the right times to stop you thinking about plot holes: things not to do with a sideboard and an angle grinder in a confined space are highlights.

It’s interesting to note the nods to American horror films and the tweaks to these tropes – and mis-steps – that feel very European: the sequence where the camera follows Marie around Alex’s parents’ house have a European heft; whereas maybe the car chase goes on too long.