Humains

I watched this movie because I'm learning French, and because I am pathetically in love with Sara Forestier after watching 'Le Nom de Gens'.

Unfortunately, this film is bobbins. Total bobbins. It's one of those movies that makes you wonder, at what point did ANYONE think this was a good idea?

If you wish to experience how bad this movie is, simply imagine the worst episode of the X Files possible. Then have someone kick you in the balls.

Despite this movie's suckiness, I'm still in love with Sara Forestier. And I still think that Dominique Pinon has a brilliant face. I want to make a movie in which Dominique Pinon and Toby Jones play gay lovers.

With France undoubtedly being THE best horror-producing country at the moment (points of reference include: "Inside", "Frontier(s)", "Them" and "High Tension"), this brand new movie was high on my must-see priority list as soon as I noticed it was programmed at the annual Fantastic Film Festival in my home country. I was even more confident upon learning that the directors of "Humains" are the same guys responsible for the genuinely masterful make-up art in the aforementioned "Inside". This is the debut feature of the duo Jacques-Olivier Molon and Pierre-Olivier Thevenin, and they opted for a gritty survival horror concept with solemn anthropological undertones and a consecutively bitter ambiance. The plot is too absurd to label the film as an instant classic and it takes slightly too long before the pace properly picks up, but "Humains" is nevertheless a professionally made and highly compelling shock-adventure with truly stupendous filming locations and a fantastic, unremittingly barbaric last half hour that will cause you to leave the theater speechless and in a moderate state of shock! Professor Schneider and his two closest assistants travel to a remote Alps valley region in Switzerland for an essential anthropology expedition, as they found strong evidence about the origin of the human race that could actually alter all existing evolution theories as we know them. Shortly after their arrival, and after picking up a stranded and constantly bickering family of three, their minivan dramatically crashes down a mountain. The survivors are first subjected to a devastating showdown with nature itself before facing a rough and deadly confrontation with the greatest anthropological discovery in history. The cinematography is stunning the suspense gradually builds up towards a few very intense climaxes, but the major plot twist halfway the film is just too implausible. Also, I'm afraid we've seen a bit too many variants on survival & backwoods horror lately and the large variety of inbred freaks, hillbillies and mutant families simply aren't that menacing anymore. Not even in this case, where we're dealing with bona fide and unhinged cavemen. Still, the acting performances are stellar (Dominique Pinon is brilliant again) and the make-up effects are obviously grandiose, with a handful of stomach-churning death sequences that are jaw-dropping cruel. "Humains" is definitely recommended to experienced fans of grim survival horror and even to admirers of National Geographic Channel; as long as they fast-forward the sickening parts.

HUMAINS seems to be gathering a lot of bad reviews here on the IMDb, but I have to confess and say it wasn't all that bad. Certainly it's no classic and indeed it feels slightly below average for the genre, but it's a lot more entertaining than your usual braindead American slasher or the like.

The French setting immediately gives it a level of quality that's atypical for the genre. The format of the main characters going on a hike to the Alps to search for the missing link is an interesting one, and although the set-up turns out to be more effective than the denouement, at least HUMAINS has plenty of action and incident to keep the viewer watching.

On the bad side: it's rather cheesy and the prosthetic make-up effects look silly and like something you'd expect to see from the 1960s rather than now. On the plus side, HUMAINS has something of the foreboding of a film like THE DESCENT, with which it shares more than a few similarities, and the character actor Dominique Pinon is always a pleasure to see up on screen. You could do worse, in other words...

I saw this film at the BIFFF. A film festival in Brussel, the movie felt like a ripoff of the hills have eyes and the descent. The only thing that interested me was the science behind it all. That there special species evolved before the homo sapiens came. The acting is not terrible but nothing special either. The directors were make-up artists on the film A la interieur. It showed it was there first movie, because of the feeling you get you are watching a shameless copy of the above mentioned Hollywood films. The gore in the film is also not so great, after seeing the film Matyrs i know for a fact, the french film community can make something really frightening. If i can give you an advise watch it on DVD.

'Humains' is not a pure horror movie, hence the horror movie audience is bashing it for not having enough mangled corpses. In the first half of its running time, 'Humains' is an adventure flick about people lost in the wilderness, reminds me of John Boorman's 'Deliverance', with the additional spice that they are totally unprepared to walk for miles. The 'dumb' characters are actually quite realistic, because I wouldn't expect big city folks, picked by random and put in the middle of nowhere, to behave much wiser. Compared to the silly high school kids you often find in horror movies, a good choice of actors. In the second half, it does get more violent, but interestingly, that's hardly caused by the ugly guys, and without giving anything away: I loved the ending, it's almost poetic.

The movie does not try hard to be scientific. This is the second reason why many people are bashing it. The professor didn't tell the young assistants a lot before they start exploring, and it's more like "imagine what would happen if..." than providing a plausible theory for the existence of big noses in Switzerland. There's one thing I like about monster movies of the 1950s or 60s: nobody expected you to be scientific, just put the monster on the screen and get on with it. Today it's definitely harder to convince the audience.

All in all, I think 'Humains' is treated somewhat too harsh here. It has a couple of good points and overall atmosphere, it has a few weak points, too - but if you do not expect a horror movie like 'The Descent', but rather a fantasy adventure trip in the mountains sort of thing, it is worth checking out. Actually, I think it would have sold better if they avoided the little bit of gory violence, as there isn't much, anyway, and thus made it to a censorship rating allowing a younger audience to watch it.