HIGH TENSION

A Holiday break from school turns wrong for two college students in the horror-import, HIGH TENSION. The French film, made in 2003, provides a similar set-up for American audiences. Marie and Alex elect to spend their Holiday break at Alex’s family’s home in the country. It should be a relaxing time for both, but a maniacal killer has different plans.

Several leaps in logic present themselves in HIGH TENSION, but the final revelation turns the film from unreasonable to unbelievable. Much of the movie plays like a well-oiled teen slasher flick. You accept the implausible events, sacrificing realism for the sake of fear and horror. As HIGH TENSION progresses, or digresses as the case is, it bites off more than it can chew, and climaxes with a conclusion that seems to cheat us out of a legitimate answer. Further adding to my frustration is a poorly dubbed version of the film, with an accent that doesn’t seem to match one of the character’s ethnicity. With a minimal amount of dialogue, this is one foreign-language film which would have sold just as well with subtitles. HIGH TENSION has a few thrills, but not enough to compensate for its other inadequacies.

Grade: C-