Calvaire

I was excited for my first foray into the "New French Extremity," and I feel completely let down by this movie. Really cool Belgian movie that I was enjoying up until the "dance scene. " After that, it just all fell apart for me. I was just left confused and unsatisfied at the end.

An all around solid movie. The acting was disturbing and well done, the filmography was gorgeous (especially that last bit), the parallels between the farm animals and Marc were clever, and I love the lack of music (outside of songs sung/played by characters) up until the very last scene. I found the ending, while sudden and ambiguous, very well directed. I will say the portrayals of madness were pretty outdated, but the emotions you could see on the actors faces and in their voice made me believe that they were real people living a real life. I love the slow burn, and the the pacing too. It never felt like it dragged on or anything to me, it just flowed smoothly. The switch of intensity was pretty jarring but still well set up, so once it took off it felt like a natural progression. All in all, great watch! I definitely recommend, but only if you can handle prolonged torture and bleakness for an hour and a half. Oh, and don't mind reading the captions or listening to French lol. 5/5, but I'd really say 90/100.

If you liked Wake in Fright you'll probably enjoy this. Its like a slightly more grounded Wake in Fright mixed with Backwoods, and a certain Stephen King adaptation. This isn't 'scary horror' as much as its 'you've found yourself in bizarre world. ' I'm usually a little skeptical of french horror but this movie definitely didn't reinforce my skepticism. Try it out.

Bonkers film. If you like isolationist horror with weird people then this is a fun and memorable romp.

Ok movie