Seemingly created by a gamer who wanted to see his post-apocalyptic fantasies spawned from first person shooters come to life, Phase 7 plays out with an air of mocking nonchalance as an epidemic unfolds and the residents of an apartment complex gradually begin to pick one another off in a battle for survival. Writer and Director Nicolas Goldbart has got a firm grasp of what elevates good horror and thriller films above the rest: the deterioration of the human psyche and of social norms when death looms right around the corner. The epidemic isn’t turning people into zombies and in fact its symptoms are so utterly vague as to just be influenza, but that’s not the real purpose for it, it’s just a device to rationalize quarantining 16 new neighbors and a maid (or 13 people and a maid if the Chinese family isn’t home) inside a small space to concoct a worst-case behavioral scenario. For all intents and purposes, Goldbart succeeded.
We all know a couple like Coco (Daniel Hendler) and Pipi (Jazmín Stuart) they constantly bicker and then have a few moments of quiet reconciliation where they just bask in one another’s company, perfectly content. Then the bickering continues. It’s the perfect introduction for these two main characters as they exit a grocery store as panicked people flood in, with the duo completely unaware due to their back and forth discussion about light bulbs, attitudes, and all that other stuff that weighs on a relationship. The gag can be likened to the Shaun of the Deadmoment where Simon Pegg’s character walks from his flat and passes by scenes of devastation, oblivious to anything other than getting his daily coffee. In that opening we meet the couple and learn that the pregnant and impatient Pipi and the reluctant Coco have differing views on how to do just about everything. It’s not long before they arrive home to discover the news reports of the epidemic that has swept the world and Coco gets caught up in the justifiably paranoid scheming of his neighbor Horacio (Yayo Guirdi) who takes him under his wing and makes him his partner in the battle of blood and bullets that will ensue among the residents.
Without Daniel Hendler’s performance as the average Joe who just wants to settle in with his wife and wait the whole thing out, Phase 7 couldn’t have worked. The whole concept of two residents in bright Hazmat suits and gas masks going head to head with a septuagenarian (Federico Luppi) armed to the teeth and convinced of a “kill or be killed” outcome can’t work if the film is taking itself too seriously; so Goldbart plays it with a tongue-in-cheek vibe via Coco’s inability to avoid the traps he helped set and the sort of boyish enthusiasm for war games he occasionally exhibits. Acting as the uber-survivalist Ying to Coco’s deer in the headlights Yang is Horacio, the conspiracy nut next door that has a bomb shelter and all the supplies necessary to wait out a nuclear holocaust and devolves into a soldier at the first hint of conflict. Guirdi plays the role straight as required, but Goldbart managed to play Horacio’s over-sensitivity to apocalyptic signs against Coco’s “I just want to go home” misery and scores the much needed laughs to add levity to the film, thus preventing it from becoming a live re-enactment of a video game shoot out.
Phase 7 works because it’s never about the virus, it’s just an excuse for protective suits and gas masks which completes the video game vibe. Combine that with the terrific score by Guillermo Guareschi that sounds like a duel between Vangelis and Thomas Bangalter using a waterphone, a theramin, and a blaster beam. It really is the perfect music for the film as it’s playful unto itself and only helps to deepen the feeling of Phase 7 as a goofy intersect between epidemic horror and video game violence.
DVD Bonus Features
Deleted scenes are all you get, and there's a optional English dub, but don't use it. Dubs are awful.
"Phase 7" is on sale October 4, 2011 and is rated R. Action, Horror, Thriller. Written and directed by Nicolas Goldbart. Starring Daniel Hendler, Federico Luppi, Jazmin Stuart, Yayo Guirdi.
