Inside (2007) *contains spoilers

[whitezombie]

I rented this DVD on the same weekend as I watched Martyrs. I decided to watch Martyrs first, as I'd read that this was the film that provided the biggest gutpunch, of the two. Boy was I wrong!

I'll not go into any details of the story, as I'm sure you can read this elsewhere.

Despite the fact that not very long is spent introducing and establishing the characters, I nevertheless felt that enough time was spent so that you at least care for and identifty with the main character, if not with some of the peripheral characters. By the end, I also felt some amount of sympathy even for the 'baddie'.

The atmosphere throughout is pretty much edge-of-the-seat, and kept that way thanks in part to the lighting, and the fact that, once the action starts, it doesn't let up.

For the most part, I find that a fair few of the foreign language films' special effects don't stand up to closer scrutiny due no doubt to the fact that the budget is tighter than your average Hollywood blockbuster, and most probably the average English-language film, simply due to the number of people who can watch it in it's native language.
A recent example, where I thought the special effects let the film down was Martyrs.
This, however, is most definitely not the case with Inside. With the odd exception (the main character's nightmare sequence perhaps, which looks a bit too CGI), the effects are VERY well done, and very gruesome. At some points we were wincing and pleading with the 'baddie' not to go through with what were some of the more extreme parts of the film.

Overall, I'd highly recommend this, if you have the stomach for it (pun intended ). I'm very picking with my film scores, and haven't given an 8/10 since, well, Ok, since Monsters, but before that, it had been a while.

A well deserved, 8/10.
I'm not quite sure what can top this in terms of extreme, visceral violence, and not sure I want to know!

[Ancient One]

Told you it was gory. I still think Martyrs is by far the more harrowing of the two and the hardest to watch.
Try Frontier(s) next.

[whitezombie]

Originally Posted by Ancient One

Told you it was gory. I still think Martyrs is by far the more harrowing of the two and the hardest to watch.
Try Frontier(s) next.

Indeed it was gory! I can't really think of anything gorier tbh. Films like Braindead always crop up as being 'gory', but it splatstick, so don't really count it.
Guinea Pig: Flower of Flesh and Blood maybe, but it's a different type of gore, more clean cuts, rather than messiness as in Inside!

I found Martyrs to be a little, well, I don't know, I just didn't find it all that convincing!

One of the chaps in work should hopefully be lending me Frontier(s).

[whitezombie]

Oh, how come Totalfilm didn't review Inside? I've looked, and definitely can't find a review online!?

[Kiba.]

I think it was reviewed in the magazine but it was a few months ago.

[STFUDonny]

Originally Posted by Ancient One

Told you it was gory. I still think Martyrs is by far the more harrowing of the two and the hardest to watch.
Try Frontier(s) next.

Love these gory French extreme horrors, such a step up from the clap-trap horrors that are coming out of Hollywood.

I agree Martyrs is a harder watch and definetely the better of the two, but Inside is still a very good horror movie. Frontier(s) was also good, though I was completely lost on the politcal subtext.

[Ancient One]

I used to have Inside