Territories (2010) Reviews

• Greetings from Guantanamo Bay, Canada

  Coventry2011-04-11

  Deranged and sadistic psychopaths kidnapping randomly unfortunate travelers in remote areas with as sole purpose to humiliate, torture and eventually massacre them. There have been SO many movies with this exact same plot outline over the past five-ten years that it has almost become a sub-genre on its own; a hybrid between hillbilly-horror and torture-porn. The only more thing directors of these films can do to distinguish their effort from the others is being as creative and extreme as possible in drawing the characters of the psychopaths. The crazier, blood-thirstier and more perverted, the better. Olivier Abbou clearly understood that message, as the villains in his film "Territories" are uncannily straight-faced and nihilistic killers who recreated their very own and private mini-version of Guantanamo Bay in a deep-hidden forestry region on the Canadian border with America. Dressed as border patrol officers, the two apprehend a car full of twenty-something Americans returning home from a wedding. Okay, they have a broken headlight and were carrying a small dose of soft drugs, but the main reason they stopped the car is because the driver of the group is called Jalil El-Haddad. The fake officers accuse Jalil of terrorism and before they properly realize, the entire group is locked up in separate cages in the middle of the woods. Although well-made and occasionally very atmospheric, "Territories" inevitably remains a derivative and forgettable effort. The first half of the film is admirably tense and contains a number of unsettling shock-moments (the interrogations with the prisoners who are weakening physically as well as mentally), but still you can't escape the impression you have all seen this a dozen of times before. Then, rather incomprehensibly, the tone swifts during the third act with the introduction of a completely new protagonist. A hired private detective is on the lookout for the missing tourists and all of a sudden the plot exclusively follows him around, even to restaurants where he seduces waitresses and his motel room where he stuffs up his veins with heroin. He confronts the kidnappers a couple of times, but the victims and their continuously deteriorating conditions suddenly don't seem all that important anymore. The acting performances are more than decent and the filming locations are very effective, but the main impression raised by "Territories" is déjà-vu.

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• Absolutely terrible!!!

  ppptttooo2011-09-24

  This movie made no sense at all! It was a waste of 2hrs of my life! It had a good beginning for about 45mins, but after that, all started going downhill. I am not a film reviewer, and I have never written any reviews before, however, this film made me so angry>:O that I felt compelled to register with the website and voice my opinion. One of the sub-plots might not as well have existed and it wouldn't have made any impact on the movie whatsoever! It is a shame that the film writers did not make enough effort to show consistency and plot progression. Instead, they patched up the film full of non sense; and what starts in a promising way leaves the viewers totally disappointed and puzzled. Very weird...and please find something better to watch and don't waste your time watching this!

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• Not all films have to have clear plots ...

  dylan-chauvin-smith2011-10-13

  Oddly enough, the bad reviews on this site were what enticed me to actually watch the film. Besides the first review by Coventry, which had some constructive criticism and actually compared this film with others within its genre, the reviews all took issue with the episodic quality of the films plot. It seems that they haven't been introduced to the concept of art cinema - a mode of film practice which subverts and breaks from classical filmic conventions like continuity editing, and strict causal relations between narrative events, instead focusing on the psychological depth of its characters and the "everyday" realism of disjointed, unrelated events. This film definitely shows various qualities of the art cinema, especially its episodic structure and focus on character psychology. I found the plot intriguing and despite what some of the other reviewers said, I think that the introduction of the private detective was not arbitrary but actually contributed to the creation of the expectation that the tortured would be rescued. By building this character who can sympathize with the families of the missing, as he has ostensibly lost his own daughter, the director effectively takes the audience out of the roll of victim-by-proxy and into rescuer-by-proxy. This is clever because by the time this plot line is introduced, the viewer has become frustrated with the course of events (as trapped in them as the tortured) and the detective becomes the voice for the audience, while also giving them a view onto the other side of the tragedy of kidnapping/forcible confinement. As for the ending ... I cannot believe that one of the previous reviewers complained about the fact that the ending did not gesture to a sequel. I'm sorry bud, but sequels did not exist before the late 80s early 90s and the dawn of the multiplex theater. I also disagree with the suggestion that the film doesn't allow the audience to interpret the final events in any way that they wish - because that is exactly what the ambiguous ending does. The lack of closure makes it the viewers responsibility to interpret the ending in whatever way that they can. Overall, the film was esthetically pleasing and definitely generated the reactions thrillers are supposed to. Maybe for Coventry the film is just another in a long line of psychopath/kidnapping/torture stories, but I have seen few which are as dedicated to the art of film and not very tangibly grasping at demographics in hopes of being successful. Also I would say that Territories fell well within the range of the independent film mode, and far from that of the B-film - despite its low budget and virtually unknown cast. Definitely a film worth watching - at least for those who can appreciate films which reveal their artifice by making the viewer think.

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• 1 hour 35 minutes total waste of time!!

  sepand_pourteymour2011-09-24

  I just watched this film, and it was the worse film I have ever seen; so bad that I had to register on this site to leave the feedback. The starting 30 minutes was really good; good acting and a very interesting story plot. However, after their arrest and being kidnapped, things went down the hill really fast. There were no story, no historical, economical or any story line of any sort observed, and even by introducing a private detective things didn't improve at all. Furthermore, the ending was totally appalling; no indication to a sequel, no complete ending and not even any thoughts lead so that viewers can continue with the story as they see or prefer, in order to make the film more anticipating. I seriously recommend everyone not to see this film unless you have around 2 hours free time to do absolutely nothing, but then, watching 3 episode of friends back to back or repeatedly is much more fun.

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• So, what do you think we should shoot today?

  davidfurlotte2011-09-29

  It is quite evident that this thing was pieced together on a daily basis. I refuse to believe that someone actually sat down and wrote a complete script for this pile of trash, but I would love to know how they pitched this thing and managed to get someone to put up 3 million to put it together. SOMEONE is a very good salesperson to pull that off. The beginning was great and the actors did a fine job of showing confusion, anger and then surprise and fear when they are taken hostage by these two deranged "customs" agents. But once we're past that we lose any semblance of there being a plot or reason or motive behind these guys doing this. There's a few things that just don't make a lot of sense. Where did the guys get the uniforms, for one and obviously the local cops have been keeping an eye on these two. After the beginning it really seemed as though you had some small film crew take a bunch of actors out on a camping trip and each day started out with a creative meeting that began with, "What are we going to shoot today?" I should have listened to the other reviewers who said to give it a pass, but I didn't. If you get to this review PRIOR to watching this, please do NOT, you will thank me and the others here later if you watch something else...ANYTHING else.

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