In most zombie films the characters are seeking a safe haven to lie low in, but the run down tenement with its drug lords and immigrants becomes an ally of the zombie masses who function as a cannibalistic return of the repressed.

In one slight twist of the form though, the central characters are desperate to escape the building they find themselves within. In line with recent zombie films these are swift moving creatures, and are a very persistent threat. For example they offer no explanation for the zombie masses, they just appear out of nowhere and wreak gory havoc. The Horde is also a zombie film, and the writers Arnaud Bordas, Yannick Dahan, Stéphane Moïssakis, and Benjamin Rocher are clearly conversant with the conventions of the form. The Horde situates its action in a rotting apartment block in Northern Paris, flipping the convention of middle class point of view to the perspective of rogue cops, violent gangsters, and the disenfranchised working class. Several of these major French horror films are ‘home invasion’ narratives, they offer a bourgeois vision of bland suburbia which is then shattered by the return of past events. The Horde follows in the footsteps of Switchblade Romance (2004), Frontier(s) (2007), Inside (2007) and Martyrs (2008) in its unflinching portrayal of blood and guts and while it lacks the subtlety and intelligence of Them (2006 - for my money the most accomplished French horror film of this recent new wave) it makes up for this with its political overtones.

There is a noble tradition of striking in France, a tradition that seems in large part to have the sympathy of the population (an attitude which is quite different in the UK for example) and this melting pot of political upheaval and uncertainty surfaces quite notably in the latest gore soaked French horror film The Horde. Issues such as the economy, pensions, the retirement age, and immigration have seen citizens take to the streets in protest. French horror cinema is enjoying a period of unparalleled creative success, and it comes as no surprise to me that this coincides with a period of civil unrest in the country.

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