The Plague (2006)

(In French, On Cable TV, April 2022) There’s an intriguing premise that gets The Plague going – what if all kids under nine (and any new babies being born) fell into a coma for a decade, and society had to adjust itself (through vast medical wards in high-school gymnasiums, for instance) in order to cope with the event and try to find a cure? So far so good, and you could imagine a great Children of Men-type science fiction drama trying to deal with the repercussions of such a mass social trauma. But here’s the thing: As a cheap nasty horror film, The Plague isn’t interested in any of that except making the kids-and-teenagers come out of their coma as ravenous hordes of zombies. At that point, it’s as if any interest in the film just pops to nothingness: Despite writer-director Hal Masonberg’s very occasional ability to find a striking image or two, The Plague soon and quickly disintegrates into yet another cheap zombie film, with very little to distinguish itself even when it thinks it’s trying to do something different (such as a group intelligence, for instance – it magnifies but does not change the problems facing the characters). Clive Barker’s name is prominently associated with the film as a producer, but he may have preferred remaining anonymous on this one. Humourless, witless and interest-free after a semi-promising first fifteen minutes, The Plague would ideally be avoided like its namesake – except that, seeing the way many Americans have embraced Covid, that expression doesn’t have the weight it once did.