Book Review: Films of the New French Extremity: Visceral Horror and National Identity

By the mid-2000s, following social unrest and political upheaval in France, and culminating with the emergence of the “torture-porn” horror subgenre in the United States with titles such as Saw (2004) and Hostel (2005), the NFE effectively merged with the horror genre, resulting in some of the most violent and transgressive films in modern times.

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Fans and scholars of the New French Extremity genre will welcome Alexandra West’s Films of the New French Extremity: Visceral Horror and National Identity (Jefferson: McFarland & Company Inc., 2016, 205pp., $40.00), a timely and well-researched examination of the darker side of French cinema. The New French Extremity (NFE) genre evolved from the French art-house movement during the late 1990s and incorporated brutal, unapologetic depictions of sex and violence, often with damning underlying sociopolitical commentary. Film critic James Quandt famously coined the term New French Extremity in 2004, disparaging the genre as “a cinema suddenly determined to break every taboo, to wade in rivers of viscera and spumes of sperm, to fill each frame with flesh, nubile or gnarled, and subject it to all manner of penetration, mutilation, and defilement.”1

By the mid-2000s, following social unrest and political upheaval in France, and culminating with the emergence of the “torture-porn” horror subgenre in the United States with titles such as Saw (2004) and Hostel (2005), the NFE effectively merged with the horror genre, resulting in some of the most violent and transgressive films in modern times.

Xavier Gens’s Frontière(s), a blistering commentary against the French right-wing political establishment, maximized familiar tropes from films such as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and features a rural white supremacist-Nazi cannibal clan as the antagonists, hell-bent on eradicating a group of young, urban Parisians, some of whom are Muslim immigrants.

While Quandt’s apt description meant to disparage the burgeoning genre, West argues that these films are not violent but rather about violence and its larger impact on the world. NFE films present an honest and unflinching view of France and the social problems and unrest that have been present since its inception. In two of the chapters, West frames the historical context of violence, revolution, and artistic practices in France, which reminds readers that socioeconomic strife and resentment between classes and communities has served, and continues to serve, as a wellspring for civil unrest and political upheaval, and points out that France’s film industry has helped shaped its culture for over the past 100 years.

The emergence of the NFE in the late 1990s, and its subsequent transformation in the early 2000s, is no anomaly. The rise of the right wing in French politics during this period and subsequent social unrest, including the infamous Paris riots between immigrants and law enforcement, colors many NFE films with themes of class and communal warfare and unveiled warnings about the dangerous intentions of reactionary French politics.

First-time director Franck Richard made The Pack (La Meute) toward the end of the New French Extremity movement’s identifiable span, and the film, loaded with gore, splatter, and familiar North American horror genre tropes, was ultimately pulled from its public film debut at Cannes in 2010 amid concerns the level of violence and gore could disturb a potentially unsuspecting audience, according to West. The film pits a female lead, Émilie Dequenne, against a clan of subterranean zombified creatures and was widely dismissed by critics for failing to satisfy any of the subgenres it dabbled in.

In 14 chapters, the book carefully tracks the emergence of the NFE in chronological order beginning with an examination of Gaspar Noé’s Carne (1991), I Stand Alone (1998), and Irréversible (2002), and proceeds to analyze nearly 30 films. North American fans of the NFE are most familiar with titles such as Haute Tension (High Tension) (2003), Ils (Them) (2006), Frontier(s) (2007), Á l’intérieur (Inside) (2007), and Martyrs (2008) – all of which receive an in-depth analysis by West. Lesser-known titles are also covered, providing fans with a substantial list of additional films to seek out, although admittedly few of them are for the faint of heart, including one of the most difficult to watch entries, Baise-moi (2000). The book concludes with an insightful chapter on NFE directors of American remakes of The Hills Have Eyes (2006), Mirrors (2008), The Eye (2008), and Maniac (2012).

Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury’s Á l’intérieur) (Inside) is one of the most revered fan favorites of the genre, a violent and vicious portrayal of a late-term pregnant woman named Sarah in the fight of her life against a psychopathic female home intruder determined to cut the unborn child from Sarah’s womb.

West’s analysis is, thankfully, readable and relatable, avoiding the often suffocatingly dull academic prose found in genre studies. Films of the New French Extremity will most likely serve as the analytic lightning rod for fans and scholars of the NFE for some time to come, but hopefully will not be the last commentary for such a controversial genre. While the book is thorough, it is by no means is exhaustive, leaving the door open for further study. Films of the New French Extremity delivers a timely and concise catalog of NFE standouts, and should whet the appetites of fans and scholars alike, presenting the first comprehensive overview and timeline of one of the most challenging genres to emerge in recent years.

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Note: All images are screenshots unless otherwise indicated.