La meute

I wonder whether the script for this one was complete before filming began or whether they just made things up as they went along. The film is a tonal mish-mash, falling into three distinct segments of notably varying seriousness, starting as a coarsely comic affair it then moves into dark "woman in peril" territory, ending in the realms of loopy siege horror. Fortunately things are underpinned by a fine lead, inspired villain and constant dark ambiance that is rather chilling at times. We follow the attractive young Charlotte Massot, driving across France when she picks up a long-haired hitcher. Stopping off at a roadside restaurant they narrowly miss getting raped before Charlottes new friend goes missing and things get worse from here. The film combines numerous backwoods horror tropes into one tasty brew, geographic isolation and cultural isolation with all character bar the heroine being rather strange, threat of being raped, threat of being eaten, broad characters and wonky dialogue, all dealt out with mania that never winks at the audience, no matter what the cliché. Handy performances give this one a big leg up, Emilie Duquenne is a delightful lead, tough but convincingly frayed when things get nasty, and affectingly traumatised when her ordeal gets nasty. Eric Godon gives suitably greased up and shifty vibes as the hitchhiker, while Philip Nahon plays things broad as a dirty minded cop. Highest marks go to Yolande Moreau as physically imposing, fearsomely tough restaurant owner La Spack, homely looks and unwieldy size hiding creepy malevolence and impressive vigor. Director Franck Richard largely plays things unflashy but has some imaginative flair, the film is focused less on action or big setpieces than mood, with plenty of time spent highlighting the grim and grimy art direction, bleak surroundings and atmospheric outdoor conditions. Some gore, though the gore scenes are around just long enough to be appreciable rather than dwelt on. Score and sound design brood, erupting in industrial pounding when events really hot up, a good complement to the visuals. Tighter handling would have helped this one, also some better dialogue but altogether I had a great time. Well worth a look for loopy backwoods/hicksploitation horror enthusiasts.

Viewed at the Festival du Film, Cannes 2010

One of the best things about the Festival is how everyone who loves film, whether it's for fun or profit, often piles into a cinema for a shared experience, whereby you get folks of all nationalities and tastes often watching a film they normally might not bother with. The Pack is a perfect example.

This is a cross-genre horror film that also wants to make some social comments, especially about the how and why of the creatures, hence my use of "meandering" in the summary. As has been mentioned by a previous poster, it starts as one film, changes to another and then goes a different way. At the same time, the elements do work, perhaps better individually than as a whole. Even so, The Pack is fun and it's nice to see a European horror film get a good reception.

The usual genre rules are there: Don't pick up hitchhikers, don't stop at a desolate restaurant run by a weirdo, don't get caged up in the basement as a snack for locally marauding monsters. In fact, maybe give all of France and Belgium a miss?

There are the obligatory jumps and shocks, some black humour, the requisite gore and the final last standard. In that sense don't expect anything new from The Pack. But at the same time there is a sure hand on the tiller, except for this meandering, which could have been sorted out at script stage. It doesn't damage the film as more as weaken the effect it could have. But my criticism is more the disappointment of how a good film misses being great, so on that basis The Pack was given a very good reception and makes for some enjoyable thrills, chills and spills.

Particularly since the new Millennium, France is by far THE nation to keep under close monitoring when it comes to the release of original, boundary-breaking and downright shocking new movies in the horror genre! They released already a handful of instant classics, like "High Tension", "Inside", "Frontier(s)" and "Martyrs" and a fair bunch of titles that are far more worthwhile to check out than the average American or Asian accomplishments. Naturally, of course, they also have their share of epic failures and the inevitable "close-but-no-cigar" efforts. "The Pack", a co-production with Belgium - would fit right into this last category. Writer/director Franck Richard mixes old and tiresome genre clichés with fresh and courageous ideas, and the overall result is a massively uneven and quirky film. What starts out as a seemingly commonplace rural road horror movie abruptly alters into something unclassifiable; partially survival flick and partially zombie adventure. But not your typical kind of flesh-eating rotten corpses, but more like the pioneering type of zombies as they featured in "White Zombie", "I walked with a Zombie" and "Plague of the Zombies". The sudden change of course I found titillating, but these most fascinating parts of the screenplay are underdeveloped and chaotic. Perhaps Richard shouldn't have wasted his (and our) time with the overlong, dull and derivative first half and should have moved on to the more creative and ingenious plot a lot quicker. But the main issue of "The Pack", according to yours truly at least, lies with the mundane character development and ineffective atmosphere building. Lead chick Charlotte is another headstrong and rebellious feminist on the run for something which we don't know. She picks up a mysterious and not-so-handsome stranger whose silence clearly reveals a hidden agenda. They encounter psychopathic bikers, a creepy corpulent woman owning a ramshackle truck-stop diner and a goofy old guy with a funny T-shirt. These are hardly new and exciting characters to feature in a horror movie and thus you set your expectations quite low from the beginning already. The numerous attempts to insert black humor completely miss their effect and Franck Richard also doesn't make full use of the morbid set pieces and filming locations. The ghouls (and the brief info we receive of their background) compensate for part of the disappointment, though. They're very disturbing and petrifying monsters to behold. They actually look quite Clive Barkeresque, if you ask me. There's some decent acting as well, most notably from Yolande Moreau as "La Spack" and the terrific Philippe Nahon, whom genre fanatics will certainly recognize immediately from "Haute Tension", "Irréversible", "Seul Contre Tous" and "Calvaire".

On a lonely country road, Charlotte ( a young angry woman ) is travelling in her rusty old car ... clearly running away from something, which is unclear. Along the way she picks up a hitch hiker by the name of Max. Max is a strange man, but Charlotte could use the company. When they stop at a Truck Stop, owned by a woman named "La Spack" , Max mysteriously goes missing when he goes into the mens restroom. When no one else is giving her satisfactory answers concerning his whereabouts, Charlotte decides to investigate further, and unknowingly falls into a trap.

This is another very recent New Wave French Horror that may initially disappoint you to start with, but on second and third viewing, the film comes across as a lot of fun, but not much else. The characters were paper thin, but there were some very memorable performances, in particular, Yolande Moreau as La Spack. A very sinister and unique type of villain. That was one old woman not to be messed with! I loved the costume designs for the creatures, which also brought some fairly decent gore as well! Unfortunately the gore was few and far between and for a film of this nature, it was a little disappointing to see that the bloodbath that was on offer, wasn't as bloody as it could and should have been. The ending is fairly straight forward, which concludes a fairly straight forward film. If you are a French Horror fanatic, such as myself, this one will interest you. If you are just a casual viewer, this movie isn't something you haven't seen all before.

'tough girl' Charlotte is also a bit of a daft twit, who doesn't mind picking up hitchhikers, even falling asleep while allowing him to drive, snoop in her belongings, and take her to an out of the way backwoods diner. When he disappears into the restroom of said diner and never returns, she's hellbent on finding this complete stranger. And that's far from the last mind-blowingly stupid decision she makes. Furthermore, while it was nice to see French horror mainstay, Philippe Nahon playing a local policeman in the movie, it only served to remind me of other more quality horror films. Ones that this movie can't help but fail in comparison to. The creatures are visually striking but that's pretty much it.