STUDIO: Lionsgate/After Dark
RELEASE DATE: May 9, 2008
STARRING: Karina Testa, Aurelien Wiik, Patrick Ligardes, David Saracino, Maud Forget, and Samuel Le Bihan
WRITTEN BY: Xavier Gens
DIRECTED BY: Xavier Gens
GENRE: Horror
RATING: NC-17

Where was THIS Xavier Gens when they were filming Hitman? That dull, boring, by-the-numbers piece of junk doesn't even belong in the same filmography as Gens' previous work, the daring, over-the-top, borderline insane Frontier(s), a film that the After Dark HorrorFest reportedly deemed too violent for their 2007 "8 Films to Die For" Festival. Now, After Dark and Lionsgate are releasing the NC-17-rated film in select theaters this Friday and on DVD next Tuesday, giving it a life outside of the relatively unsatisfactory After Dark label. The "French version of Hostel" is far from perfect but it's ambitious, the direct opposite of not only Hitman but most of the film's in this year's After Dark (which ran a pretty weak 2.5/8 on a thumbs up scale). And it's not for little ones. But unlike a lot of American filmmakers who merely copied the gore from Saw and Hostel, Gens is using it in much more interesting ways, using the force of blood and guts to show that life may be bad now, but it could be a LOT worse.

The "bad life" refers to the deadly race riots that have taken place in France in recent years. After an altercation with riot police, a group of young men and one pregnant woman (Karina Testa) head for the hills. Not only is Paris a hotbed of violent activity, but the group has just pulled off a daring heist, which left one of them dead. They need to make it to the border...now. They decide to meet up at a hostel near the frontier to hide out from police and let things die down. The peaceful inn looks empty and safe, but these poor souls have clearly forgotten the number one rule of travel that movies have taught us - never be the only customer at the lodge. There's a reason there's no one else there. Well, no one else alive. Our weary travelers run across not just your ordinary cabal of inbred freaks, but a group of neo-Nazis that are hiding out and still experimenting in the French countryside. The group learns that there are worse power-hungry maniacs out there than the French government and struggle through a series of tunnels, gas chambers, pig sh*t, and hungry subhuman cannibals. It's one messed-up movie.

Perhaps it's because I see so many by-the-numbers horror movies but when a director is willing to go as far off the rails as Gens tries to go in Frontier(s), it goes a long way with me. At the same time, gore purely for gore's sake drives me crazy. Just look at my "worst of 2007" to see how I felt about Saw IV, Captivity, and The Hills Have Eyes 2. They make my stomach turn thinking about them. Frontier(s) is (mostly) not gore for gore's sake, even though it contains several scenes as disturbing as anything in those films. Sometimes Gens pushes the gore too far when tension could have been created with something a little less bloody but he gets major points because there's something deeper going on here and there's rarely anything going on below the surface in American horror films. The parallel drawn by Gens between the French police and the current race riots and the Nazis and their quest for racial purity can't be ignored even if it isn't as fully fleshed out as I would have liked. Frontier(s) is a good movie that could have been great. And even if you ignore the interesting themes of power gone mad, Frontier(s) simply contains some of the most affecting imagery in the genre of the year. There are shots and moments that you will not forget and I can't wait to see what Gens does next, assuming someone gives him another project after Hitman.