No.184 : The Decline (2020)

The Decline at the IMDb

Like our previous film ‘The Objective’ this film also has a group of people who are gradually whittled down by a relentless killer, but that’s where the similarities end, as this one was quite good.

Made by Netflix, the film is French/Canadian and the version I watched had dubbing that would make a porno blush. I think you can watch it in the original French and view the subtitles if your O'level language skills are lacking, and that would present the film at its best. I watched it dubbed with sub-titles and it was strange that barely a line of dialogue matched the words spelled out below.

Anyway, we open with people looking over a dead body wrapped in a bloody sheet and we wonder how we got here - well you’ll need to wait 34 minutes before you catch up. We meet Antoine who, in Chas Tenenbaum style, rouses his family in the night and evacuates them from the city. We learn that it was just a drill and that the next time his daughter’s turtle is getting left behind. Antoine worries about social decay and feels that things will kick off soon. He preps his family by watching Youtube videos of a Ray Mears style outdoorsman who gives handy tips on preserving rice and bush craft.

Things get moving when Antoine is invited to a survival camp hosted in the wilderness, by his hero. Things start off OK, with some rabbit skinning and dish washing, but we start to wonder the agenda when the arts and crafts lesson turns to pipe bomb manufacturing and the conversation to immigrants with machetes. Clearly our man is a nutter, but before the visitors can make their excuses and leave, one of them is blown up and killed by a home made bomb.

Our previously counter culture visitors agree that they should really be calling the cops, but the survival nut host, Alain, says no and  starts to burn the body. Protests from the group see one shot in the leg and another three, flee into the woods where we know plenty of traps lie in wait. Alain teams up with return guest and fellow mentalist David, and the hunt is on.

Who will survive? Will it be family man Antoine whom we have invested in or maybe the military woman whom we know is good at wrestling moves? Surely not the shot woman tied to the table?

Despite the poor dubbing I really liked this film and it kept a heady pace throughout. It’s hard to comment on the acting, as the dubbing took so much away from the performances, but it was likeable and believable group of characters. I liked how they all started out as survivalists fearing ‘the man’ only to have to re-examine their positions once things went out of their comfort zone.

It was good that it was quickly whittled down to a two versus two scenario and there were a few surprises to keep you guessing. The deaths were all visceral with plenty of blood being splattered across the fresh snow. Of course, you will have seen a survival horror along these lines before, but there were enough fresh elements and twists here to keep me engaged.

I’m not sure why it was called ‘The Decline’ - a decline in society? Declining numbers of survivors? Probably lost in translation. At only 85 minutes this is a quick thrill and definitely one to spend some of your Nexflix time on.

THE Tag Line : Survive This!  75%

No.100 : The Serpent (2006)

The Serpent at the IMDb

 Sub-titled French movies aren’t a staple of The Definite Article Movie Review but this one is well worth a look, not least because Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko shows us what she’s made of.

An old chap thinks he’s got lucky when the sexy Olga goes on a blind date with him but you get nothing for nothing and soon a sinister gang of blackmailers is on his tail. He pays up but it’s never enough. We think he’s being used to show us how the gang operates but he will reappear down the line so remember him and his hearing aid!

The bad guys look for their next mark and choose Vincent. We think he’s been targeted at random but nothing is what it seems in this labyrinth plot. Vincent is a fashion photographer in the midst of a messy divorce from his wife with whom he is still living. He arranged a shoot for the next day and is surprised to find Olga is his late replacement model and his helpers can’t come in as they have been beaten up. The shoot goes well and Vincent thinks his luck is in when Olga gives him a nice kiss - and she’s a scratcher too! Alas he has to run but next day the cops charge him with attempted rape.

The charges are dropped and Olga comes by to tell him he’s been targeted in a scam. Just as we are starting to think she’s nice she drugs his drink and soon the whole gang arrives to photograph Vincent in some kinky poses. He revives just in time to see Olga leave and as he chases after her she falls from his unnecessarily dangerous staircase, seemingly to her death. Vincent, who is already on the police’s radar, calls his lawyer who, on finding no trace of the body, thinks his client is nuts. Things get worse for Vincent however when he’s rear ended and finds Olga’s body in his boot and the cops have just arrived.

The other driver reveals himself to be an old school friend of Vincent’s and he arranges to get the car fixed and the body disposed of - you don’t get that service from Aviva! The body hider, Plender, starts to turn the screws looking for cash and a few free dinners at Vincent’s.  Our man starts to investigate his menacing friend and after his lawyer is killed he realises that the noose is tightening. Charged with murder Vincent goes on the run - can he turn the tables on the blackmailer and save his family from the freezer of doom?

I enjoyed this superior thriller and although it was a bit long there were enough twists to keep me interested. I liked how the troubles piled up on Vincent and it was hard to see how he could escape the elaborate traps that had been set by the dead-eyed Plender. The ending was a little too pat for my liking but I did enjoy the twists most notably the grave robbing!

Yvan Attal was excellent in the lead role as the troubled Vincent as was Clovis Cornillac as the malevolent Plender. Plender’s motivation was well documented but it was a bit unclear why he waited for his Mum to die before focusing on Vincent. Maybe it sent him over the edge or he’s just got plenty of patience. The blackmailing scenes were well done with the poor suckers reeled in by the slick and sexy operation and I liked the creepy shine to the dear departed mother.

All in all this was an enjoyable Gallic thriller with my only real complaint the title - not a serpent in sight apart from the tattoo on the bad guys back - should have called it ‘French Blackmail/Revenge Film’ - at least that does what it says on the tin!

78% Best Bit - Olga’s lingerie shoot

No.49 : The Horde (2009)

The Horde at the IMDb

My totally legitimate and well subtitled copy of the French zombie thriller ‘La Horde’ gave the title in translation as ‘Legion of Evil’. That hardly fits a definitive article quest but given the UK release is ‘The Horde’ and that the subtitle for a man getting his face eaten was ”Gracious me!” I think we are on safe ground.

If you’ve seen pretty much any zombie film, you’ve see ‘The Horde’ - but this time it’s in French! The usual rules apply about only head shots killing and bites being infected but I’m happy with that - what if they introduced flying zombies? The purists would be apoplectic!

Some less well viewed reviewers have likened this film to ‘Rec’ but apart from it happening in a building with a monstrous twist I don’t really see it. The film opens with a piss poor police raid on a block of derelict flats. We’re not quite sure that they are cops as they are a bit quick to stab up the guards but basically they are on a raid. They get to the flat but the intervention of a trigger happy superintendant and training that must have come from the British Secret Service causes things to go tits up.

The bad guys quickly off a couple of the cops and are about to wipe them out when one of the dead gets up to eats a bit of face. As in all these films there is a caveat that none of the characters have never seen a zombie film or played ‘Resident Evil’ because no one shouts ‘Shite it’s a horde of zombies’ instead they all flap about saying ‘what’s going on’ in French.

Soon we are down to three cops and three bad guys and they then get sub divided into a two and a four. Of the two the sexy lady cop has a bitten colleague for company and he’s starting to turn. Luckily she’s handy with a gun and indeed a fridge. Meanwhile the foursome meet a wacky axe man resident who has a penchant for zombie tits and then split up when a long simmering dynamic in the bad guy hierarchy boils over.

As they try to escape the building the horde closes in and as numbers dwindle we have to wonder if they’ll do the tired old route of having the seemingly weakest character, the lady, being the sole survivor. Of course they do!

Despite its formulaic plot and set up there is a lot to like in ‘The Horde’ and I enjoyed it throughout. The zombie action doesn’t rear up until about a third of the way in but by then you’ve had time to invest a little in the characters before they get eaten. I liked the relatively slow build up with the chaos in the city beyond only seen fleetingly in reflections and the like. If this were a student film you’d suspect that this was a cost saving device but not here because the cast of ravenous thousands is soon revealed in all its blood splattered glory.

They do well to mix up the formula with some great fight scenes between characters and zombies with all manner of implements and household appliances roped in to help the carnage. It does help that this is the best tooled up apartment block in all of France with industrial machine guns and grenades lying about all over the place.

I’m not sure but I think there were a couple of bits of commentary about France’s colonial past and the subjugation of women but happily these soon passed for the next round of carnage. I’ve no idea of the body count apart from ‘huge’ and the methods of dispatch were fun, varied and totally uncensored. It is of course a tired old formula but ‘The Horde’ is definitely the best zombie film I’ve seen since the ‘Dawn of the Dead’ remake. OK I know that wasn’t that long ago but it had a dog being dangled amid zombies in it!

THE Tag Line : Horde, Gored, Not Bored 78%