French Film Collection(Film 21) THE HORDE (2009)

ENGLISH SUBTITLES INCLUDED FRENCH AND ENGLISH DUBBED TRACKS INCLUDED With its simple yet ominous title, nifty concept and low budget styling’s it seems almost strange that Yannick Dahan and Benjamin Rocher’s cops, gangsters and zombies action horror hasn’t already been done. Though some might argue that it actually has already been done actually and been done several times over, La Horde nonetheless rises above its solid genre trappings and stands out as undoubtedly one of the finest examples of zombie cinema in the whole sub-genre’s decomposing canon. pontypool still As with all the best, zombie movies The Horde’s human characters are the focus of the story . In this case those characters are a vengeance-driven bunch of bent cops raiding a notorious gangster’s hide-out in a crumbling slum-like tower block. This simple set-up works perfectly and sucks the viewer into the violent and bloody world of these people well before we even get a glimpse of one of our undead antagonists. Of course, once they do show their rotting faces the two warring factions are forced to make an uneasy alliance in the name of common interests, namely not being torn to frayed and bloody fragments at the teeth of hundreds of walking corpses. From there the plot follows a fairly predictable trajectory with a few minor but welcome surprises along the way such as Alain Figlarz’s stand out performance as the gleefully war-obsessed janitor. The zombies themselves are of the running variety and follow all the usual traits and rules – head shots kill them, bites infect etc. Though this may all sound fairly standard, what really marks this film out is the sheer energy and style with which it is done. In most films featuring the living-challenged the protagonists are a motley collection of untrained random people who must come to terms with not only the undead menace but also with physically smashing in the skull of something which until recently was another human being. Though that yields interesting subtleties of its own it’s also great to see tooled-up professional bastards doing what they do best and bringing the pain to legions of the screaming dead. Some of the best moments in La Horde come when various characters are forced to go toe-to toe with their necrotic enemies and show that a ravenous hunger for human flesh and maniacal fervour are no match for a lifetime’s experience of knocking the holy living shit out of people. The film also looks great with its grotty lighting scheme enhancing the inherent seediness of the location. The blood that regularly gets liberally spattered against these walls and floors is clearly not the worst substance they have ever been in contact with. The special effects are used sparingly and effectively with perhaps a little CGI sheen to a few shots but the majority of effects being done practically. There are also some very cool images created and the almost-traditional shot of the zombie legion swarming at our hero in a sea of raised arms and grasping hands has never looked more brutal or terrifying as it does here. Of course, the film has its flaws and first-time directors Dahan and Rocher fall into the trap of giving us too much of a good thing. The film runs a good twenty minutes longer than it ideally should which is a shame as if it was pared down it would be a real blood-slicked streamlined thrill ride of outright gore-soaked exuberance. As has already been pointed out both in this review and in many others it also offers very little that the genre or average viewer has not seen before. In these circumstances however this doesn’t matter in the slightest, it may be little more than a cover version at heart but it still rocks like a motherfucker and it’s still great to dance to.

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