ILS (THEM)
France/Romania, 2006, 77 minutes, Colour.
Olivia Bonamy, Michael Cohen.
Directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud.
A small terror film in the vein of storytelling like Wolf Creek where unsuspecting people, feeling safe in a different environment, are hounded, hunted and killed. Ils is not exactly designed to encourage tourism to Romania!
However, Ils does very effectively what it sets out to do: create an uneasy atmosphere, build up suspense and a mood of fear and heighten it to terror. And all without special effects or gore, which, along with the brief running time, is a big plus in its favour.
There is a typical alarming prologue with a mother and her sullen daughter driving at night, mysteriously crashing – and experiencing even more mysterious ends. Transition to the French school in Bucharest and introduction to a very nice teacher, Clementine (Olivia Bonamy) who drives home to her boyfriend, Lucas (Michael Cohen) and what should be a pleasantly ordinary evening of domestic doings, meals, TV, assignment corrections…
But, after three in the morning, they wake and quite a lot of things go bump and beyond bump in the night. The last third of the film takes place in those late dark hours, the terrorising of the couple in the house by unexplained intruders (or ghosts or what?) with their finally escaping the house and ending up chased through the stormwater drains under the city.
It’s certainly eerie and those unused to this kind of terror will find they can identify with the characters and find the film really scary. Those of a more blasé temperament who have seen it all before may still be impressed by how the film-makers have put it all together.
The film announces at the beginning that it is inspired by actual events and a rational, alarmingly rational, explanation is given at the end – which does not diminish the horror of it all.
1.The reputation of this film as suspense? Horror? Terror?
2.The visual impact of the film? Digital photography? Wide screen? The desaturated tones? The infrequent hints of colour? The action taking place at night? Within the confines of cars, homes, drains and sewerage tunnels? The musical score? Atmosphere?
3.The title? The mystery of its references? The ultimate revelation of who ‘they’ were?
4.The film allegedly based on actual events? Romania, children, terrorising adults? The hiding in the sewers? The emergence at night, the brutality? The implication that the children wanted the adults to play with them – and killed them when they would not? How credible? How plausible?
5.The prologue, the mother and daughter in the car, the mother and her edginess, the cantankerous daughter, her make-up, refusing to speak to her father, her mother slapping her, the mobile phone dropping? The sudden crash? The raised hood? The disappearance of the mother? The car not starting? The daughter and her panic, outside, locking herself in the car, her death? The creation of atmosphere?
6.The transition to Clementine, the French school in Bucharest, dictation, leaving, chatting with her friend? Driving, the phone call to Lucas? Her arrival? The phase of domestic scenes – after the initial opening, before the terror? Clementine and Lucas together, their love for each other, domestic scenes, the shower, the meal, his cooking, after the meal, watching the television, going to their room, her doing the corrections downstairs? The mystery of the telephone call?
7.Awaking in the night? The eerie sounds? Their seeming to be supernatural rather than real? The reaction of Clementine, going downstairs, Lucas? The build-up of the tension, the sounds, the mysterious presences? Their moving from room to room, the windows, the noises and the shutting? The appearances of hooded people? Lucas and his being wounded and Clementine caring for him? The nail through the keyhole? Her going into the attic, trying to get out, pushing the mysterious stranger from the roof? Returning, their going downstairs? Their going out, looking for the car? The mystery of the car and its movement? The pursuit? The final terror?
8.The gradual revelation of the presences, the children? The flight to the fence? Clementine over, Lucas not being able to? His gradually being pursued?
9.Clementine, going down the well, in the tunnels, the pursuit by the children, the boy urging her on, her following him? The brutality, the children hitting her? Her escape?
10.The irony of her coming to the grid? The cars passing by? Her not being able to get out? Her disappearance?
11.The aftermath and the information? The deaths of Clementine and Lucas? The arrest of the children, their being aged ten to fifteen? The horror of this kind of story?
