Spoilers for this film ahead, be warned this is a VERY DISTURBING FILM.
This is one of the most brutally violent films I have ever seen and I DO have trouble watching that, if you don't maybe that is a very bad thing! I do think violence is an important part of cinema though and I acknowledge that hiding from it does not work either. We have to face the reality that there is truly brutal violence every day somewhere in the world.
I personally get a bit uncomfortable with films that place you in the "minds" of killers as it is asking you the basic question "could you do that? could you enjoy it?" It is a very dark and difficult road to go down, once you realize the horror mankind is capable of, you realize one of the things you must also consider is how to come to terms with the monster that is inside every person. We saw the terrible atrocities of Nazi Germany and acknowledge that Hitler was the leader...but how often do we talk OR EVEN BLAME the evil of the German people at that time, especially the concentration camp guards! Didn't they have a choice?
So in this sense, "High Tension" brings us into this same (but different) conversation. This appears to be a break-in slasher film...plain and simple. Near the end of the film, our lead character Marie is revealed to be the person behind all of the killings...the killer is actually HER. Her and the faceless killer are one in the same...or maybe two sides of the same coin.
A film like this challenges us because we identify so much with Marie that when this switch happens, our relationship with her becomes quite complicated! We are suddenly sympathetic (if even for a moment of STUNNED transition) with her as we realize with HORROR that she was just brutally murdering a family, we stand up and say "oh my...no! It can't be! I would never do that!" We still like Marie, she is like us isn't she? She has only been attempting to escape evil! We have been rooting for her to escape this whole time. We are with her still...right? NO and maybe yes too, that is the true horror here, we want her to survive and be okay...but wait she is a MURDERING PSYCHO!
In this sense, "High-Tension" is an incredible piece of film work because it challenges us to confront what evil is and very carefully plots a THRILLING course of action that ultimately makes us come to terms with a very scary concept...ourselves. Even more shockingly when you realize that she may have just done all of this for the sake of a very perverted definition of LOVE...oh my.
Let us talk technical elements because these things matter and my subjective opinion on them should be noted here as always. The house the film is shot in could not be any better. At first the sun-bathed house is complicated in design with each character appearing to have their own space separate from the rest of the characters, we think "thank God for privacy." It is an open first floor with beautiful sprawling spaces and it is remote, no bothering neighbors - "Hey! That looks great!"
There is a very intense scene where Marie begins to pleasure herself, leaving this here not as a perverted statement of fascination but instead as a means of acknowledging an important horror concept. This is a well-known concept of what horror films refer to as being "the original sin," often a woman making a choice to no longer be "pure" (symbolically or not) meaning she is no longer a naive virgin and has sexual intercourse for the first time - she has committed a sin. It is also noted here too that she pleasured herself to the image of her best friend Alex, who she spotted naked in a window. In the film "Halloween" where it appears this concept was started, the filmmakers made it clear that their film was not mean't to be "designed" this way, it was sort of just the way the storytelling worked out. So this religious concept of sin was more a popular INTERPRETATION of this NOW absolutely essential slasher/horror concept. In reality, this original sin concept is more of a tradition and in this we find the seeds of what makes "High Tension" work effectively as BOTH a traditional genre slasher film and a daring NEW experiment in it.
Back to the beautiful house. When the killer arrives at night fall we realize that for all the same reasons we felt safe/at peace in the house...that the house is a FUCKING NIGHTMARE. It is easy to get killed here and no one will hear you scream (to quote "Alien") and its is so open that you can't make a break for the damn door and lets just say the neighbors ain't coming to help because there is none.
This spins us into our first rollercoaster drop in the form of a carefully plotted survival thriller series of sequences where the dripping of a water faucet could get you brutally murdered. Everyone is killed in horrible ways, so horrible you almost do not want to go on watching. It should be noted that the director has an excellent understanding of TENSION and he uses details like the faucet to create obstacles for the lead who is really trying to achieve perfect stealth, she is virtually attempting to turn invisible - we don't blame her - to be seen here is to be DESTROYED.
In the end, once we crash cars into the DARK FORREST, we have a face-off scene in a strange tented greenhouse that is ONE FOR THE AGES. In this environment, Marie first ARMS HERSELF and takes on the mantle of - THE HERO, or one who can take action to defeat evil or even just change the outcome of her own destiny. She is now the FINAL GIRL (virtually), so time to start acting like it.
She wraps barbed wire around a damn post and in this beautiful shot...
We see she really means fucking business, we too are emboldened by this decision "lets go get that son of a bitch!" So then she DOES IT by hitting him with the pointy post, and he does not die at first, building on the legend of the SLASHER FILM, like his forefathers (the unholy trinity of Michael Meyers, Jason Vorhees and Freddie honorable mention: Ghost Face) we realize the "faceless" killer (bastard) ain't gonna die too easy, in fact he is going to virtually return from the dead to fight and try to kill again. She then suffocates him and in the end she lets out a violent and painful scream. She has vanquished evil...she has been reborn, she has purged herself of SIN by confronting evil and is no longer naive.
The film now takes its most daring turn and it should be noted here how we have already been "satisfied" as a viewer by the vanquishing of evil and the purging of sin as in a traditional slasher narrative. The filmmaker, must be given credit for carrying on in a NEW/BOLD direction here and it happens, appropriately, in a foggy forrest. The fog of the forrest creates an almost dream-like quality but it also takes on other meanings, the fog of a person's mind attempting to get most in touch with reality or truth, the true nature of things.
It is traditional to have evil carry on living and destroying (Michael Meyers is STILL out there at the end of "Halloween," bullets did not stop him) but now the filmmakers REDEFINE everything we have just watched so carefully - which is the strength of a great plot twist. Plot twists are strongest when they redefine our perception of a character's morality and made even better when plot takes on new and more significant psychological meaning.
"High Tension" is exactly what the title implies, a high-stakes thriller. What is most exciting about the film though is how it uses traditional elements of the slasher genre and also "kills" them and burns them and in the ashes we cannot help but celebrate the birth of something dark but vibrantly NEW.
Budget: 2.2 Million
Box Office Mojo Grosses: 6.2 Million Worldwide
