AFM 2010: Sales Art Debut: Xavier Gens’ The Divide

Steve Barton |

Nov 1, 2010

With AFM starting Wednesday, the horror goodies keep on coming. The next bit of goods to come our way is the sales art for Xavier (Frontier(s)) Gens’ upcoming horror flick The Divide, formerly known as The Fallout.

The film stars Michael Biehn, Rosanna Arquette (David Cronenberg’s Crash), Courtney B. Vance (“Law & Order: Criminal Intent”), and Lauren German, an actress whose credits include The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Hostel 2.

German’s character is at the centre of the film, set in New York, which is virtually destroyed in a mysterious explosion in the first act. Eight survivors take refuge in the fallout shelter of an apartment building, where they are menaced first by mysterious men in HazMat suits and eventually by each other.

“Director Xavier Gens follows his $99 million grossing ‘Hitman’ with THE DIVIDE – a high concept post-apocalyptic thriller that opens with pandemonium and a chaotic sprint towards the basement of a New York apartment building, just moments before the city outside is decimated…

When a cataclysmic explosion devastates New York, eight strangers take refuge in the basement of their apartment building, a converted fallout shelter designed by their paranoid superintendent Mickey. With just three connecting rooms it’s barely big enough, but with stockpiles of food and water, the group are at least safe from the horrors outside, and they settle in and attempt to fathom the catastrophe that has ended the lives of so many of their loved ones.

But suddenly men in HAZMAT suits storm their shelter and open fire. The strangers join forces in a desperate bid to take on this enemy, with no one understanding what these HAZMATS are looking for and what drives them to be so merciless.

With fatalities on both sides and the remaining HAZMATS temporarily pushed back and locked out, the worst is yet to come for the group. Cabin fever sets in as the perception of the shelter shifts from safe haven to claustrophobic rat-trap. Fear of radiation-poisoning and dwindling supplies play on their minds, while the young, beautiful Eva has more immediate worries… Her fiancé Sam is weaker than the other males, who are slowly starting to regress into ruthless, violent predators.

As tension mounts, their sanctuary becomes a living hell, and with Sam powerless to protect Eva, she must rely on her wits to save herself from becoming at the mercy of the pack in a thrilling final act.

With twists and turns throughout, and no way of knowing who will make it out alive, THE DIVIDE is an action packed psychological thriller that combines ‘Assault on Precinct 13’ with ‘Lord of the Flies’. To survive the end of the world, you first must survive each other…”