Saint Ange

For the life of me, I cannot understand the fierce and almost resentful nature of many of the opinions given here. I was fully prepared to see another one of those over-blown affairs that put style over substance and usually bore me to bits after 15 minutes or so of their „Amélie"-type smugness and undeserved self-confidence. In fact. SAINT ANGE is a very careful, very sensitive story of a young woman who struggles with her feelings about her impending motherhood. The ending made perfect sense to me, whether read as a ghost story of sorts or a paranoid fantasy. The actresses are uniformly excellent, particularly Virginie Ledoyen and Lou Doillon, as is Catriona MacColl, who you might still remember from those colorful Fulci extravaganzas from the early eighties. The splendid photography makes good use of the grey and cold blue colours of the orphanage, which is embedded in green and brown tones – Mother Nature. The fantasy ending also introduces a clinical white for good measure. In view of the many cinematic exercises of today that talk their subtexts to death, SAINT ANGE uses a formal elegance that is breath-taking. Actually, I didn't find one single frame that was superfluous. In a way, the film also shares several themes with Laugier's well-received and harrowing MARTYRS, as it is basically another – albeit more tender – tale of a bruised young woman under dire circumstances. The ending of MARTYRS can also be read as a paranoid fantasy, with traces of hope hidden in a complex framework of depressing human depravity. No, I liked SAINT ANGE a lot. And, by the way, Joe Lo Duca – who started with Sam Raimi's THE EVIL DEAD – delivered a haunting and memorable music score. An excellent movie.

From the tone of these comments you would think this was the worst film ever made (and a few comments say that literally). It wasn't as good as "The Others" and such, but the worst movie ever? Please. It was well shot and the minimalist production design was a welcome break from hyper-stylized films like "Silent Hill". The story did take a long time to develop, but the tension built nicely and it had an Argento feel to me. Not every movie has to be "Transformers", moving at Mach 10 from the first frame. Maybe the more subtle storytelling nature was why everyone reacted so poorly. It certainly didn't beat you over the head with plot points, and did feel like a key scene or two was left out of the final cut (setting up the kittens for example) but overall was a nice, spooky little film. Everyone's opinion is valid if course, and it's nowhere near my favorite film, but I had to defend it for some reason. Maybe it's because there are so many TRULY bad films out there, and I want people to save their venom for the movies that deserve it.

Saint Ange starts pretty amazing and sets you in the movie's gloomy mood immediately but the truth is that the movie is bad. The settings for the movie are indeed very good and with a solid storyline and correct flow the movie would have been a great one. The shots, colors, lighting and close ups are truly amazing but it's a shame that the movie starts to bore you after halfway, also there are lots of things that don't really make sense leaving you confused and in the end it's somewhat unbearable so you pray for it to end finally. My 3 rating is only because the film's photography is truly brilliant otherwise i would have sticked to 1.

I don't usually watch horror movies, but this one had such a good look to it that I thought it might turn out to be a "thinking person's" movie like THE HAUNTING or THE UNINVITED. As it went along, I started thinking more of TURN OF THE SCREW, because there were implications that the visions Anna was having were due to her unexplained previous abuse and her mysterious pregnancy...and she was making others believe in the visions (like the nanny in TURN OF THE SCREW). But how does that account for the boy's death at the beginning? The last third of the movie is a complete letdown because of the introduction of fantasy elements beyond the limits of the movie up to that point. (The elevator is the first clue that we're going off track.) I can't believe how many IMDb posters actually seem to believe that the subterranean scenes are somehow "real." There is no evidence that anything sinister was ever done to the children who came to Saint-Ange during WWII. There are SO many interesting ways this movie could have played out...too bad they chose a dud ending. However, I have to say that Joseph LoDuca (Xena) did a marvelous score, which has to sustain a huge amount of silent action. This is definitely a movie to watch with a fast forward button.

"House of Voices," the first feature film by Pascal Laugier, contains many of the elements that made his 2008 cult-classic "Martyrs" so great. Both films start off in a predictable, genre-specific way -- then gradually reveal darker, stranger, subterranean layers that defy our expectations. Of the two films, "House" is lighter fare, while "Martyrs" is far bloodier and much, much more disturbing.

"House of Voices," begins as a slow-build Gothic ghost-story, in the vein of 2007's "The Orphanage" or 2001's "The Others." "House" works quite well on this level, featuring engaging female performances, a slowly-unravelling mystery, some handsome cinematography, a lush dramatic score, and some moments of genuine dread. But then, in its final act, the film takes a sharp and surprising turn toward the surreal. I could describe what happens in these scenes, but what really makes them work is the way they're filmed -- the simple strange visual power of these moments. Suffice to say, while you might have a general idea where the plot of this movie is headed, you will probably not foresee exactly how it arrives there.

The final scenes of this movie plumb some nightmarish depths, departing stylistically from the subtle Gothic-horror which came before, and entering far stranger territory. Don't worry; it all adds up. This isn't one of those horror films which leads you on, only to end with such strangeness that you have no hope of understanding what the movie was about. No, everything here makes sense in terms of the film's plot. It's just that the film's sudden stylistic change is jarring and surreal, evoking the kinds of unexpected shifts we might experience in our deepest nightmares.

For me, this movie worked quite well. I see some others here have given it bad reviews. I gather that's because they don't know how to tell a thoughtful, well-made film from worthless pap like the "Saw" franchise. This certainly isn't the best movie I've ever seen, but it's a very fine, thoughtful, moderately scary film with a bizarre final act that might haunt you afterward.

If you like this film, and you have a strong stomach, I'd certainly recommend Laugier's "Martyrs." It plays the same stylistic tricks as this film, but much more intensely, and to greater effect. Word of warning, though: It is a far more disturbing film than "House of Voices."