I have become more and more impressed with French Horror over the last couple of years. 2007 Brought us “Inside” and “Frontiers” and in 2008 the French presented us the wickedly awesome Martyrs. Now they present us with a zombie film for our viewing pleasure. All I can say is it’s about damn time. The Italians and the Spanish have been doing the Zombie genre for years and the French were due for a decent zombie film. Happily I can say that The Horde does not disappoint.
The premise of the Horde is simple, some rogue cops find the hideout of a group of thugs and intend on breaking in and killing them. The hideout is inside an abandoned apartment building. Once in they run into trouble and end up hostages of the gang. The only problem is there is a zombie apocalypse happening outside in the city. Now the cops and the gangs are locked in the building trying to figure out how to stay alive. Now the two opposing forces have to decide whether to work together or split up to survive the apocalypse.
To give fair warning these zombies are of the 28 days later kind and not of the Romero brand. I know this will turn some away but once you start watching the film you won’t be able to turn away. While the film features a good amount of action, there are decent horror elements including some nice gore effects. I wouldn’t say the film is entirely original as it does use some cues from not only prior zombie films but also zombie video games. Without giving it away you will see one of the characters in a situation found in the Dead Rising video game. Aside from that reference the main characters also are similar to those found in the Left 4 Dead game series.
The Horde is a fun ride that any zombie fan would appreciate. A large budget, decent acting, and some nice gore effects put this film on the higher end of the zombie movie spectrum.
--Steven M. Duarte
