Inside (a l'interieur, 2008) Horror Movie Review

Inside (a l'interieur) is a horrifying film with a dismal respect for life, but lost a rating and a half for an unlikable heroine.

Written by The Pastor of Muppets
December 30, 2008

Watch the Inside Horror Movie Trailer



Release: April 15, 2008 (U.S. DVD Premier)
Written and Directed by: Alexandre Bustillo

Starring:
Béatrice Dalle as La femme
Alysson Paradis as Sarah
Nathalie Roussel as Louise
François-Régis Marchasson as Jean-Pierre
Jean-Baptiste Tabourin as Matthieu
Dominique Frot as L'infirmière


Here we have yet another unrelentingly morbid and fatalistic view of life. Of the two extremely bloody, nihilistic movies I saw this past weekend (Eden Lake being the other), Inside (a l'interieur) is the bloodiest and, at least theoretically, the most horrifying. However, it must be said that the actual horror is mitigated by the fact that the main character, the pregnant woman, is not very likeable. She's not evil, but she's certainly not the kind of person you can get wholeheartedly behind and cheer on, which is what this movie needed in order to make it work. So that drops Inside (a l'interieur) a grade and a half right there.

Anyway, the pregnant woman, a photojournalist whose sole friend in life seems to be her boss, has a run in with a strange nurse at the hospital who has some rather sadistic things to tell her about the pains of childbirth. After rebuking the nurse, she returns to her home and settles in to recuperate. Then a stranger knocks at the door with some story about their car breaking down, but she refuses to let them in to use the phone - at which point The Strangers - style home invasion begins and blood begins to flow.

The intruder in this case, however, is a single person, and it's not long before we realize it's none other than the whack- job nurse from the hospital. We also begin to realize it's not the woman she's after, but the baby. I'll leave it at that, as the movie does a pretty good job of setting up the ending and I don't want to spoil it. But omigod, on the way to the ending, does Nurse Ratchet ever rack up a body count. Considering that the young woman's sole friend is her boss, it's somewhat miraculous the way the screenwriter manages to work no less than seven corpses into the script. Even more miraculous is that they were able to find enough blood - substitute in France to drench the woman's house with. By the time the movie is over, pretty much everything - walls, floor, ceiling - is red. I'm only exaggerating a little here. I've never seen so much blood, whether in a slaughterhouse or in a horror movie.

Inside (a l'interieur) is yet another fatalistic fantasy. The pregnant woman perseveres valiantly - and rather unrealistically, given the amount of blood she sheds throughout the movie. Does the evil murderess get what she wants? I’ll say that we're left feeling... confused. That's the best way I can put it. By the time the end came, I didn't feel hatred or sadness or any other normal emotion. All I could think was, man, was that nurse one weird bitch. And it's true: the nurse in is one of the best - if not at every point realistic - portrayals of a truly psychotic human being I've ever seen.

My rating: C+

(Well worth watching if you have the stomach for it, but graded down for the unlikable main character and some silliness at the end.)