The brutal
French splatter film Frontier(s) opens with footage of riots in the Paris suburbs in
response to the election of an extreme right-wing candidate. It then
transitions from the frying pan into the fire, as four hoodlums flee the
authorities for the countryside and wind up in an inn operated by cannibalistic
neo-Nazis. That juxtaposition is what passes for social commentary in the film,
which otherwise commits itself to a relentlessly ugly and derivative reworking
of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Along with films like Á L'Intérieur (Inside) and Haute Tension (High Tension), Frontier(s) represents a mini-movement of
Hollywood-slick yet fashionably outré French horror that seeks to beat its
extreme American counterparts at their own game. In this particular case,
director Xavier Gens (Hitman) probably should have aimed higher.
For all
practical purposes, the election-day riots are a red herring, since the gang of
four, having just pulled off a heist, needed to get out of the city anyway.
With the exception of tough, three-months-pregnant heroine Karina Testa,
they're not an especially sympathetic lot, but their transgressions seem petty
next to those of their hosts at a country inn. The place initially seems
inviting: When two of the men first arrive, there are plenty of vacancies and a
pair of attractive and amorous women offering some hospitality. But by the time
Testa and her sleazy ex-boyfriend catch up, their friends have already
discovered the butchery, incest, and sub-human, pit-dwelling cannibals that
diminish the inn's rustic charms.
Comparisons
to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Hostel, The Descent, and the long tradition of "last woman standing" slasher
films are unavoidable, but Gens doesn't seem as interested in originality as he
does in trying to outdo his influences. Gens has plenty of style, and he and
cinematographer Laurent Bares have worked hard to give Frontier(s) a tactile quality, as if the lens
were coated in the same blood and muck that covers the characters. Yet there's
no depth, surprises, or wit to his screenplay, which seems motivated by the
sole desire to generate the vilest, most disgusting people and images
imaginable. Unfortunately for Gens, the film world is already awash more
talented and singular sickos.