"Mutants." You can remember a lot of French films, which became a real triumph and which I want to review many times. Dramas, thrillers, detectives, comedies, melodramas, action - all this is - but a worthy horror film, as it is not regrettable to say it, has not yet been born. There were very good attempts, but they were mostly, with rare exceptions, a waste of time, effort and money. “Mutants” is the first full-length work of the French director David Morley, trying once again to prove that even a country like France can make a good and interesting horror movie. The trailer fascinates, the annotation fascinates, and not so much the star cast, who said that, or rather who, will survive. All this inspired hope and accumulated expectations, but in fact, once again, there was a failure.
France. Our time. An unknown disease has swept the world, turning people into monsters thirsty for blood Right now, an ambulance is rushing along the snow-drenched road - the only mobile vehicle where Sonya, Marco and an anonymous special forces officer sit. Soon, as a result of certain circumstances, Marco is severely injured and infected. Finding an abandoned hospital nearby, the survivors contact Noe Base (a fortified military base) and wait for a response. A helicopter should arrive soon, but we still need to live to see it - Marco's disease progresses at a killer rate.
For the director-debutant David Morley worked well and did everything possible to make his creation turn out, but unfortunately, from the first minutes he makes the most gross mistake (a scene with the knockdown of a girl), because of which it may seem that the genre of creation is not a thriller and not horrors, but brazen thrash. Thank you for not making such a mistake, coping with and practically not doing such nonsense. The film itself turned out to be monotonous, boring and very, very predictable, there is no intrigue in it: the viewer will mentally put everything in place after the first ten minutes and will not lose, so that the rest of the time he will only wait for the inevitable and in every possible way be surprised that he was right. I liked the scene with the teeth (in the shower), emphasizing even a little cruelty, but all races in places is an absolute stupid scene in the finale, when the shooter in the helicopter amazingly, shooting at mutants, does not once hit the surviving hero (although you can see that the bullets just fly by). Such claims should be presented to the screenwriter Louis-Paul Desange, working in collaboration with the same Morley. Despite the fact that the idea is not original, it has the beginnings of something interesting, but in the end the development of the plot goes nowhere, turning into a predictable banalism without intrigue, and no matter how inexperienced screenwriters try to hide it, inserting in their work and an optimistic mood in the form of immunity, love, several survivors – marauders, this does not save a drop from the patterns. It’s a weak script, but Desage and Morley could have worked hard and read it dozens of times before adapting. Nicholas Massar is responsible for the camera work, and with his work he coped very well, although not forgetting about the effect of the “shaking camera”. Massar also worked well with the color scheme - the picture is very dull, gives more grayness, and this gives the picture a certain style. It is strange that the producers could not fork out for the composers or simply rejected their candidatures - perhaps the music could save the situation of the film a little, since in several scenes the music simply begs for it.
Even bigger questions are the cast. Heroes here are very few, but mutants at least plenty (they can give about 50% of screen time). Of course, the duet of Helene de Fujrol and Francis Reno stands out and they managed to cope with the dramatic line, but they can not cope with the action in any way - Helene's heroine, Sonya, shoots as if she goes to the shooting range every day, but in some situations she can not normally aim. In order to heat the picture and show a little more action, add new heroes performed by Nicolas Brianson, Luz Mandon, silent Dida Diafat, but towards the end of the film, their skill and some greatness simply disappear, and there are rum, constant running and suffering. Basically, the acting is not bad, although sometimes someone even tries to overplay, and someone does not try to open their possibilities, but in principle not bad, in some actors there is effort and desire to make the picture better.
Total:
Mutants is another failure of French filmmakers in the horror genre. A fair predictability and template very much hit the state of the creation of David Morley, where the pluses can serve a few scenes and a good cast. Everything else is in the furnace, the script is remade, choosing a normal and interesting path of development, and not to follow the lead of the viewer, who in a few minutes will reveal the idea of the director and writers. Intrigue and unpredictability are the two most important things that have not been considered, which is why the film goes down. There is no one to recommend, only to your own great wish.
Thank you for listening!
