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One of the highlights of my Cannes 2010 festival, Macabre dishes up the deaths in very assured and bloodily violent form. In a nutshell: 6 young people end up trapped in a house with a very nasty matriarch and her equally nasty offspring. Yes, there is a reason why the baddies do what they do, but you need to see the film for that!

It's true, as has already been posted here, Macabre does not break any new ground and perhaps jaded palettes will find little here to their taste, but like a well engineered German car, the film delivers the goods in messy style. Breaking with, say, the US tradition, those whom you think would or deserve to survive, do not, nor does the order of their going follow typical genre rules. Unlike in British horror films there is also no humour to alleviate the situation, although local audiences will clearly get a laugh from the stupidly bumbling police - I found them overplayed and irritating - who fortunately also provide more fodder for the maniacs!