Deep Fear (slight spoilers)
Undergound Nazi bunker, what’s the worst that could happen?
A post-graduation celebration turns into a fight for survival in the catacombs of Paris in Deep Fear. The Belgian/French horror film streams exclusively on Screambox on November 1. It will also be available on VOD platforms the same day via Cinedigm.
Three students celebrate their graduation by visiting the Paris catacombs. When they discover a bunker formerly occupied by the Nazis, little do they know it’s not the only thing that was left behind. Something, someone, is now hunting them.
So, the blurb above pretty much tells you everything you need to know about this film. Subterranean horror and Nazi’s.
We start off well with this film, the performances are good, the characters are fairly interesting and we get to know them quickly. Walking home from a night out they look like they’re being followed by some skin heads, then they get back to their flat and nothing had happened. I initially thought that I’d imagined the ominous music playing as the skinheads started following them. I was wrong…
The girl awakes with a hood over her head, the skinheads have broken in, tied up her two male friends and beaten them unconcious. The lead skinhead talks to the girl and then the single most shocking part of this film happens. It really did give me a jolt I’ll be honest but I won’t spoil it (Although now you’ll be waiting for “something” I suppose).
Then the film goes into pretty much familiar territory, 3 friends, one of whom is joining the Army, head off for some fun in the Catacombs below Paris. They can’t go the tourist route of course because, well why would you when you can risk life and limb squeezing thorugh tiny crumbling tunnels to see the secret side.
They meet their guide and go down into the tunnels, the feeling of claustrophobic tension is somewhat missing here, I think a closer angle on the camera or even a “found footage” style would have fitted better and made the viewer feel more enclosed with the actor.
The group are in the tunnels, which look like the backstage area of any arena, in fact I was half expecting Austin Powers to be in the background reversing a cart. When they meet up with the skinhead Nazi’s that appeared last night. Sonia gets a gun from the backpack of their tour guide, believe me there’s a lot of plot points that don’t make sense but just go with them, and shoots one of the skinheads right in the earlobe.
They run away and can’t get back up to the surface, this is when they hear the noise of “something” in the tunnels with them.
They keep looking for means of escape and end up in a room full of Nazi equipment and scratches on the wall counting off the days somebody has been down there.
Literally anything from here on in is a spoiler so I’ll gloss over the main points.
Nazi zombie, you guessed that right? Picture a Nazi zombie, that’s the fella. He has a dog, I’m not sure what happens to the dog but you see it once, then never again, which considering what goes on, is a bit weird (remember the plot points to not think about).
The cast gets smaller by being killed off, sometimes of their own stupidity, until we are left with one survivor.
Pretty much run of the mill genre horror. The film’s been compared to The Descent and As Above, So Below but I’d say it’s not like either apart from being set underground. The sparse tunnelling/claustrophobic segments give way to them just being in quite roomy corridors for the most part and there is no real supernatural element as it’s difficult to tell if the zombie Nazi is a zombie or just a very old soldier who’s survived on rat meat and military drugs.
There’s a lot of plot holes and side stories that go absolutely nowhere really, which leads to slight confusion but having said all that, it is a thoroughly enjoyable film with a couple of decent scares in it, just a shame they didn’t make more of the claustrophobic tension in the cave tunnel parts.
Avoid the trailer (below) as it shows you pretty much everything, which is the annoying way with trailers these days isn’t it?
Deep Fear had its U.S. premiere at Fantastic Fest. The festival described it as
an atmospheric horror full of old-school jump scares and claustrophobic cinematography, Deep Fear puts a unique spin on subterranean horror films like The Descent and As Above, So Below.
Fantastic Fest
Grégory Beghin directs the claustrophobic terror from a script by Nicolas Tackian. Sofia Lesaffre, Victor Meutelet, Joseph Olivennes, and Kassim Meesters star.
Dark, dank, and bloody, French horror is making a comeback and Deep Fear delivers the goods
Brad Miska, Managing Director of Bloody Disgusting.
Deep Fear joins Screambox’s growing library of unique horror content, including Pennywise: The Story of IT, Masters of Horror, 13 Nights of Elvira, PussyCake, When the Screaming Starts, Toxic Crusaders, and the forthcoming Terrifier 2.
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