It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

It's always interesting when one takes a genre like horror, or horror-porn and uses it to address larger themes and social issues. It doesn't always work, but when it does, as it does here (and even better in Aleksey Balabanov's far more horrific, but also more complex "Cargo 200") it can be a potent use of cinema. A group of young Americans returning from Canada are kidnapped by a pair of ex-soldiers dressed as border guards. These men were in Iraq and at Guantanimo and want to continue the torture and 'information gathering' they were part of as soldiers. So in the name of protecting the country, they lock up and torture these kids, largely because the driver of the kids' 4x4 has an Arab name. And soon you realize, given the number of innocents it's now acknowledged were (and probably still are) locked up among the 'real bad guys' in the war against terror, that this nightmare isn't very far from real ones that real people are going through right now in the name of national security. Surprisingly well acted for the budget and genre, as well as nicely shot, this certainly has moments where it shows its roots as low budget horror. There are awkward scenes, and forced bits of exposition. Logic gets stretched (but not too absurdly) at times. But it's not really all that gory (despite the allusions to 'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' on the video box), and it's most effective terror is caused by tension and fear about what might happen, rather than any blood and guts you see. Among other things, this is an interesting examination of what happens to borderline personalities who are given permission by their country to torture in the name of good. Will these people be able to let go of the monsters we willingly unleashed inside them?

The French have never let me down before. I've seen and loved many a French horror film, with four of them possibly being my favourite horror films of all time (Inside, Martyrs, Frontiers and The Ordeal). However, I'd never heard of Territories before. Perhaps it's because it isn't French language, but for some reason it slipped under my radar and it sounded right up my street, as I'm into the whole kidnapping, survival type horror film and I know that the French are so good at it, such as the brilliant, under-rated Caged. Unfortunately Territories is my first French horror disappointment, and I can now see why it is so unknown. It may have the premise of Frontiers, but it certainly does not have the execution.Territories isn't as bad as people have been saying. It's certainly not the worst horror film I've seen and it does have some redeeming factors. The style of the film is brilliant with its grainy and often raw hand-held direction it feels like a typically French horror film. The cinematography is also often surprisingly brilliant and I did like its brave and ambiguous ending, which many people feel strongly against. The opening 20 minutes were also fantastic, diving you straight into the action with brilliantly suspenseful dialogue and characters you can feel sympathy for. I love how the whole situation started off customary but then escalated into a complete nightmare, full of tension and suspense.The leading of the group into their cages also looked as if the film could be little unknown French gem like that unfortunately over-looked 5150 Elm's Way. However, it's from here that things begin to go downhill and the film turns into quite a mess, with nothing of any interest to say and with very little excitement to give. Now, Caged may have been unoriginal but it was thrilling and brimming with suspense. Territories looks good and feels good, but is actually quite uninteresting. With several heavy re-writes Territories could've been that fantastic gem that it promised to be in its opening, but unfortunately the screenplay is a complete mess.The film spends a lot of the time showing the group being terrorised and tormented, which is fine but then the film starts to drag on, without building on its already thin characters. I think the film could've benefited from a 10-15 minute introduction to the characters so that we get to know them and care for them, or at least build up their characters during the horror. Territories fails to show any interest in its victims at all, paying more attention to the torturers and later on the Nigel Havers detective (more on him later). I don't mind the film giving screen time to the torturers, in fact I applaud it for doing so as it's the villains who are often under-developed (Eden Lake is a great example of creating perfect balance between the two) but the villains were there so much that it ignored the victims of the story.Scenes also tended to drag and didn't bring a lot to the film such as the interrogation scene which was brilliant for 5 minutes, but then it started to drag and felt longer than it actually was. What was especially annoying was that the film completely detracted from its original plot-line and started to introduce this private detective who looked like a tramp version of Nigel Havers who'd just stepped out of the 80's! Here the film completely abandoned its characters to make way for a new one to fill up the final 25 minutes. It's as if the writers were making it up on the spot. Either make a film about victims, or make a film about a detective, don't abandon one and go for the other mid-way! Territories ultimately lacks focus. The detective should've at least ran parallel with the main narrative, instead of being shoved on at the end. He ultimately brought nothing to the film accept false hope, which I', all for, but if that's all he's going to bring, don't make him into a huge plot point!Ultimately Territories was a disappointment. It promised so much, but quickly deteriorated into a mess. I also felt that the film was trying to mask itself up as something more intelligent than it actually is, with its political references and sometimes weird philosophical questions. Now the film does have some good points such as the direction and cinematography, but the messy screenplay outweighs its good points, which brings us out of the story thanks to its lack of interest for its characters and illogical structure. Territories is no French great, and should remain unnoticed from people's radars.

How this has a score of 5.0 on here is beyond a joke. The first 25 mins or so were quite good with an interesting premise but then it just went completely downhill. Everything just seemed completely pointless and is never really explained. And the ending was, well, I don't know what is was but it made no sense whatsoever. The acting, music and camera-work were competent enough but the whole film seemed like it had just been made up as they went along. If you're going to make a film, at least start by having a point to it, this one didn't. So if you are looking for something interesting or exciting then avoid this one like the plague. It left me feeling cheated and quite depressed.

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.