The Divide Review: Begins Dark, and Builds to Darker
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The Divide explores the horror of human beings unfettered by laws or social norms of morality in a world ravaged by nuclear holocaust.
Written by The Horror Czar, Don Sumner
January 22, 2012
Release: January 13, 2012 (U.S. Limited Theatrical)
Directed by: Xavier Gens
Written by: Karl Mueller and Eron Sheean
Starring:
Lauren German as Eva
Michael Biehn as Mickey
Milo Ventimiglia as Josh
Courtney B. Vance as Delvin
Ashton Holmes as Adrien
Rosanna Arquette as Marilyn
Apocalyptic films are generally very popular, whether it is natural
disaster, global warming or the sudden appearance of a zombie hoard to
blame for the end of times. Part of the allure of such existentialist
films, at least for me, are the quests for survival, triumphs small and
large, the sudden desire to make peace with your world, and especially
the finding of strength and depth of character that had trouble rising
to the surface outside of a dire situation. But what if… what if none
of those things come to pass? What if the end times are simply the end,
and to survive an initial catastrophic event is simply to prolong the
agony and ensure that one’s inevitable demise is as painful as
possible? Director Xavier Gens, who also brought us Frontier(s) (2007), takes it on.
The Divide begins with a catastrophic event; nuclear explosions rocking a major city. Most perish instantly in a series of blasts, but a small group catches a glimpse of their apartment building’s superintendent Mickey (Michael Biehn) dashing into a room protected by a steel door, and they force their way inside with him. As luck would have it the room is a bunker that the super built and stocked for just such an occasion, complete with combat weapons and survival DVDs. All they have to do, proclaims Mickey, is wait until the radioactive dust settles and they can venture out and begin repopulating the world. The question is, what is the character of this rag-tag group, and how long can they stay cooped up in the bunker before their baser instincts come out to play?
This film is a bleak and dismal
look at society, the end of society as we know it and the fundamental
nature of humans and survival instincts. The film is largely without FX
other than a few opening explosions and a number of wounds and
dismemberments, and takes place in one small space relying completely
on the characters and their decline for all of the action and drama.
With so much opportunity for either a dragging melodrama or a chaotic
mishmash of people screaming at one and other, happily The Divide
avoids both.
The photography is gritty and dark, working well for the subject matter. The music, also, complements the film well, moving from melodic and thoughtful to full heavy metal in a way that heightens the tension and builds well on the growing negative energy and increasing dread.
Each individual in the film is a
different archetype that we might see throughout our lives, including a
man with outward bravado who uses it as a shield to protect his
internal fearfulness, a woman who needs to be taken care of who masks
her insecurities by focusing completely on aggressively protecting her
child, and a young man teeming with rage who controls it just enough to
keep himself out of jail. There is a strong commentary of the facades
we put up in the world that hide, in the views of the filmmakers, an
internal human “badness”. In the world of The Divide it seems
that human beings don’t necessarily have a dark side and a light side,
but rather are all dark with barriers constructed to keep it out of
view to function in society.
It only takes a relatively short time without the confines of laws and social norms for the facades to be completely abandoned and the “true nature” of these individuals to take the dominant role – vicious, violent, sadistic… evil. There are some who are at their core good, but they are the minority in this group. They are doomed.
The end of the world in The Divide is not heroic, but rather dismal from beginning to end. Nobody rises above their norm to find the bravery and goodness that lurks beneath, but instead simply becomes the worst part of themselves, and nothing more. If you’re looking for a tale of human triumph in the face of adversity you will not find it here. Instead this film dives right into the darkest parts of human nature and challenges that we confront it.
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