I was recommended Xavier Gens’ 2011 film The Divide some months back by a friend. As a fellow purveyor of films of the post-apocalyptic flavour, he said I should watch it and advised that, while the film is not fantastic, my perseverance would be rewarded with a true portrayal of human nature. It sounded like some deep shit (those last two words are actually appropriately literal in one of the film’s more revolting scenes).
So, where does The Divide stand in the pantheon of post-apocalyptic films? Is it a masterpiece like 2009’s bleak and brilliant The Road (my second favourite film)? A stinker like the cataclysmic failure that was 1995’s Waterworld (kill it with fire)? I have read some reviews that proclaim the former and more numerous others that prefer the latter conclusion. Certainly, the film’s Rotten Tomatoes rating of 22% (incidentally the same as my final mark in GCSE Rocket Science) would seem to indicate that the majority of critics think of it more as a troubling poo stain than a satisfying piece of deep shit.
Now, everyone knows that disagreeing with film critics is more fun than agreeing with them and the best ones acknowledge that. What do I think about the film? Well, I’ll get onto that a bit later. First, I will give a short summary of the plot and subsequently propose a big question, the answer to which is neither ’42’ nor ‘money’. (more…)
The Word of Tom 