A friend of mine used to say that on horror movies, thriller, etc, the secret is to... fear before actually get scared ... meaning that if the director has managed the most difficult of all, i.e. to be ready for a touch on the shoulder that would shake from the chair, everything else is simpler ... and I say more, fun and entertainment in this dark, moist and suffocating universe is born from the toxicity of the ' greenhouse ' with the ' morbidly plants ' ... and, I think, the French know the way maybe because they invented it... the whole shock is not limited to the terrifyingly vulgar or the blatant repulsive ... it goes deeper, soaks you, makes you feel ... insecure ... I think this is the most astonishing and rare that very few craftsmen succeeded in film history... the viewer feels the dorsal shiver constantly and even every time that is thinking back on the movie ... No matter how many years go by ... Let's not be exaggerated ... this movie conquers no such specific tops... What I believe it leaves is not creepy or shivery but more a. .. bitter breeze ... a taste of brackish water on lips ... something from ... elsewhere ... that strives to become familiar ...

Ignoring the music - which you feel you've heard a thousand times before - the first few minutes of this actually dupe you into thinking it might just be watchable. It isn't. The characters and their flimsily made-up backgrounds and motivations are implausible at best, which is not helped by the terrible hamming of the male actors. The whole thing soon deteriorates into Hollywood-style teen horror at its cheapest and most cliché-ridden. In short, rubbish.

I watched Livid with high hopes. I had heard this was poetic, a horrific love letter, etc... Basically, the opposite of Inside. While Inside had suspense and outrageous gore, I was never impressed beyond that material. There were very few visuals that struck me; I just did not FEEL the direction. I feel it could have been directed by anyone. That is not to say I have not seen it a few times, and would recommend it to gore hounds, and even watched it with friends just to see their reaction to the horror on screen. I thought the directors had "turnt" up their directorial flair for Livid... alas, I was wrong.This film is easily divided into thirds: the first third, we are introduced to Lucie, our protagonist. The character just isn't compelling. Catherine Jacobs fares MUCH better, but after the first third, she's basically gone. Lucile's male companions are more engaging, despite being caricatures-- at least they have some charisma, injecting much needed energy. Beatrice Dalle is amazing (no surprise there), despite not enough screen time. The second half begins the exploration of the mansion, and suffers the same fate as Lucile: it's just not compelling! Or scary. Or beautiful. Things needed to make this work, you are not there.I enjoyed the last third, as the blood flows, and directors begin to be creative. Yet, it's all slightly ruined by the flat direction. The first "attack" should have been fantastic (fantastique) but it's just not enough. The ending, I have read, to some is overblown. It is. But this is the only time the fantastic enters the picture, along with the flashbacks. But it's just not enough! What excited me most about Livid was it was compared to Lucio Fulci's The Beyond in it's sort of narrative structure, where the film is driven by fantastic images and suspense-- the story isn't unimportant, it just does not make sense. A does not lead to B, but rather 8. It's the supernatural, it doesn't need to make sense. But Livid TRIES to make sense, another of it's failings, because by the end it no longer attempts to ground itself. I would usually love that, but it's not enough.

I was interested into seeing the director's latest film and i was quite surprised because it was more watchable than the debut he made with "The inside" in 2007. I just simply couldn't watch it as it seemed to have nothing else going on but violence.Livide is a different story. It is a well-made supernatural horror fantasy which left me questioning what i had just seen. It isn't plot driven and it's very linear from start to the end with not so many surprises. I knew from the first moment that the old woman in coma was going to go after the treasure hunters and that it may end in a violent blood shed. So basically the plot isn't original at all but that's not quite so bad because the movie itself is visually stunning, claustrophobic, atmospheric, quite frightening and stylish. That's all what a horror movie actually has to achieve and it just did that.There are connections with the dance academy of Freiburg that was featured in Argento's Suspiria which may be picked up by those who have seen the movie.I found the ending quite silly but however very symbolic and the movie itself has strong symbolism in it. It has something to do with life in itself how we are put to do things against our own will and just like the ballerina was forced to dance until she broke inside, there may and will be difficulties in life but in an order to get through the bad times we must rely in others and help each other. The whole movie is full of this kind of symbolism but that was just the main idea which i think is the whole point. That's not bad for a horror movie as there are dozens of other movies in this genre which just don't make any statements of this kind. Luckily the European cinema doesn't seem to lack any of that... but Hollywood does.In the end even though there isn't much of a plot there is so much more originality in this movie in other aspects so that it is not just another movie.