The Horde



Dir: Yannick Dahan & Benjamin Rocher

Year: 2009

Cast: Claude Perron, Jean-Pierre Martins, Eriq Ebouaney, Aurélien Recoing, Doudou Masta

Genre: Horror/Crime/Action

Cert: 18

Rating: 

IMDb


The Horde is the story of a group of French police officers, lead by Ouessem, who decide to take matters into their own hands and exact revenge after one of their fellow police officers is murdered by a notorious drug dealer. They storm they seemingly abandoned tower of flats, where the drug dealer, Adewale Markudi is residing. Upon entry, Markudi and his henchmen manage to flip the situation and take the police hostage, killing one of them. As they plan to torture and the police, a massive zombie outbreak occurs, leaving both the police and Markudi and his henchmen trapped in the building. Giving them no choice but to join forces and try make it out of there alive.

Well, there's no other way to put this really, it was shite. The first...10 minutes, roughly, was interesting, trying to see if i can find a liking for any characters and to see whats going on etc. Before long the outbreak happens so I thought "Right, getting to the good stuff now" but fuck, was I wrong. Now let me go back a bit, I got this film after hearing it was great. Can't remember where, some very wrong review online. Then I saw it got awards for best special effects and screenplay. THEN, a friend of mine said he had seen it, said that it had some of the best and worst effects he had seen. So I was a bit weary but I decided I'd give it a go anyhow. About 20 mins in, I saw some of the shittiest green screen on film, when the groups are on the roof of the building it shows them looking at the city in ruin, the sky is green and looks so cartoon-ish it wasn't even funny. But, that gave me some hope. I was convinced that was the worst of the effects and was strapping myself in for a fuckin' thrill ride of amazing special effects. Much to my disappointment, I realised that there was no thrill ride imminent, just a very boring, badly written, badly acted and badly made film. Dialogue was terrible (I'd say it was probably translated wrong, but either way) and it had no character development what-so-ever. Which is extremely important in a zombie movie. It obviously should have the violence to keep gore hounds happy but should also have characters that are likable so that you have some sympathy for them or a reason to cheer them on. This has nobody likable in it, I spent the whole thing waiting for them to die. The fight scenes were done terribly also, VERY rubbery, sped-up CGI with frames missing to make the impact look real, which didn't work at all. Needless to say, this certainly isn't the worst film I've seen, not even close, but its still muck. I give it 2 stars simply because gore hounds will probably enjoy it. There was 2 scenes I was delighted with since they both were really violent but DIDN'T use CGI blood, I'm viciously against that. But even then it couldn't save the movie. Anyone who likes proper zombie movies like the original and remake of Dawn of The Dead or 28 Days Later should give this a miss maybe. But if you're one of the very few fans of the latest "... of The Dead" films then you'll probably love this... Anyway, if you can get past the shitty CGI and no real plot or likable characters, then by all means watch it, otherwise I would avoid it.

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