I am majorly arachnophobic. I know it makes little sense, especially living in the UK (where we tend not to have many deadly spiders), but my brain is just wired that way, and it seems to have got worse and worse over the years, as spiders that wander into my eyeline seem to have grown in size. Admittedly, that might be my imagination. I'm not sure of any scientific data backing me up on that.
I also like to face my fears occasionally though, especially via the medium of movies, which is why I watch so many shark movies. Is a fear of sharks some kind of phobia, or just a very understandable longing to keep all of your limbs attached to your body? When I saw the trailer for Infested, and also started to hear the good word about it, I knew I'd end up watching it. I also knew there would be moments to make me very itchy and nervous. I steeled myself, did a quick peripheral check for any creepy-crawlies that might try to surprise me during my viewing experience, and then pressed play.
Set in a run-down apartment building in France, Infested introduces us to Kaleb (Théo Christine), a young man who has a whole room full of exotic animals. That seems to be his main interest, when he's not trying to make extra money from selling designer sneakers to customers in his local community. Kaleb buys a poisonous spider from someone, takes it back home, and ends up endangering everyone in the building before you can say "incy wincy". The spider quickly starts reproducing, and all of the offspring are big, vicious, and deadly.
The feature debut from director Sébastien Vanicek, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Florent Bernard, there's a lot to appreciate here, especially in the first half of the film. Vanicek knows how to make the most of the premise as he builds up to the expected third act madness, and the pacing is great as viewers are introduced to various characters while we see their situation start to turn from good to bad, and then from bad to worse. He has a couple of scenes that really ratchet up the tension as people are unwittingly approached by a cluster of the deadly spiders. Unfortunately, a lot of that good work is undone by the second half of the film, where tension starts to dissipate as the spiders become bigger and greater in number, and the final scenes are really hard to care about, even downright laughable when it should be most intense.
The cast all do well, and well done to them all for the scenes that have them involved with real spiders amidst the many CG creations, but they're left floundering once the group dynamic has been established. Christine is a decent lead, and both Sofia Lesaffre and Lisa Nyarko do well alongside him (the latter playing his exasperated sister), but I can't say that I was all that invested in any other member of the core group. Jérôme Niel, Finnegan Oldfield, Abdella Moundy, Mahamadou Sangaré, Marie-Philomène Nga, and Xing Xing Cheng play a variety of supporting characters (some being part of the main group, some appearing long enough to add to the bodycount). They do a decent job, but it's only Cheng who manages to overcome the weak character development with her fun performance.
A lot of other people loved this, and it’s certainly hard to argue against how effective it is when that first half exploits a common fear in a way that is both nerve-wracking and playful (a scene showing spiders getting unto a bathroom is the absolute highlight of the film), but I think it’s a film of two halves. The first half is about as good as you could hope for. The second half goes downhill fast, and ultimately self-destructs in a finale that feels very hard to care about. Whether you view it as a standard arachno-horror or a metaphor for the discrimination people experience in France (and elsewhere around the world), Infested disappoints. The whole thing is still worth a watch, but be prepared to start losing interest once you get beyond the halfway mark.
6/10
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