Xavier Gans

(In French, On Cable TV, February 2022) The good news is that Cold Skin is better than your average monster movie. If you happen to see it included in your streaming/broadcasting/pirating package, rest assured that it’s more ambitious than most comparable horror movies. It takes us to 1914 Antarctica, as a meteorologist begins a year-long stint as an observer in an isolated lighthouse. A very strange isolated lighthouse, with spikes and defences crudely installed with the obvious intention of keeping something outside the lighthouse. Before long, the Lovecraftian kinship of the film is laid bare as the protagonist spends the night awake and discovers himself besieged by hundreds of amphibious humanoids attacking the lighthouse. Weapons work, but only so much—and what’s worse, he has to contend with the lighthouse’s other, unhinged occupant and a domesticated creature. (One could say it anticipates the craziness of The Lighthouse.)  From this promising beginning, however, Cold Skin runs out of steam—there’s only so much you can do with those elements, and while the film eventually aims for circular philosophy and sympathy for the creatures, it does start running around well before then. It’s a good thing that director Xavier Gans is a veteran with an eye for visuals, because the film is rarely less than finely controlled on a visual level. But the hollowness of the plot eventually catches up with Cold Skin, leaving a final act that loops back upon itself yet still fails to satisfy. It’s still more enjoyable than most similar films… but it could have been better.