First and foremost, do not believe a word anyone who reviews this film as anything less than a 6/10 has to say. There is undeniably a lack of persuasive material at the start of this film; more could definitely have been made of the initial attack, the acting is by no means as compelling as that in the second half. However, this is a film very, very much for those who like to completely immerse themselves in the storyline and appreciate the effort put into a twisted one. What The Divide does so impressively, in my mind, is take your initial, average nuclear-detonation bunker survivalist meet and greet and turn it into something so much darker.The character development (more the character decay) throughout this film is some of the best I have seen in any horror. Multiple characters are seen to unsurprisingly lose their minds, but the fashion in which it occurs is truly harrowing. There are scenes I did not expect to come across in a movie with such despicable reviews. There is thought applied here on the filmmaker's part. Without wanting to give too much away, the deterioration of one female character's mind and body is almost troubling to watch. Sexual aggression is a theme rife throughout and it is not a film for those unaccustomed to such psychological torment.Most impressive in my mind is the total absorption of the characters in these actors. It is the closest, and for that reason, most troubling enactment of societal breakdown I can envision in such a scenario. So confined, so reliant upon one another... that can and does turn nasty. The make-up is very impressive bar a few, unfortunate details (likely to not even occur to those not looking) and the actions of the character in the final scenes are some I considered exciting, spontaneous, opportunistic and required where others did not. I would suggest those of that opinion do not possess the intellectual spread to appreciate her reasons for doing as she does.A fine, fine film. One I will not forget.

I have never seen a movie so messy and so sickening at the same time. What starts off is an attack of some kind on New York that forces a group of survivors into a bunker. Right away there is a massive hole in the story - THERE IS NO WAY THE ATTACK IS NUCLEAR. First of all we open with the main character starring for about 30 second at the explosion (which doesn't even resemble a mushroom cloud). If someone looks at a nuclear blast they are blinded. This is common knowledge and most movies do this the courtesy of at least showing a bright, white flash which does happen. But no the main character looks at it like nothing.I thought I could forgive this because the person who suggests, "it's nuclear" is shown to be the slightly paranoid owner of the bunker they flee to. I was fully expecting, "it's nuclear" to be rightly pointed out as false later on. Second of all everyone's phone still works and all the electrics of the building work. Once again, this does not happen in a nuclear attack. A nuclear detonation produces and EMP which knocks all electrics out. These are commonly known things, but it's never brought up. The movie sticks with, "it's nuclear" which is simply impossible.The next section of the movie introduces the element of white suited special forces invading the bunker and kidnapping a child. We are never given an explanation over what this is about. We get one scene later of the child being discovered in some kind of incubation chamber and then it's never seen of again. Why? This obviously isn't what happens from a nuclear attack and I wanted the movie to explain what was going on. Was it a chemical attack? (because it wasn't nuclear) Is everyone in the bunker contaminated? Never explained. This isn't a case of, "it's left up to the audience", this is just bringing up a plot thread and then dropping it minutes later.The writing for the characters is simply awful because there isn't any. We don't know if some of them know each other, we don't know if they're strangers. They never introduce themselves to each other and therefore we know nothing about them as an audience. I was 30 mins in before I know what everyone's name was. Then 45 mins in I finally figured out that two of them were brothers and another two were a couple.But I could put up with this. If the movie stayed on this path, it would've been a boring mess and nothing more. But then it gets so much worse. It degrades itself into a nasty mean spirited shock fest of rape, torture and shoving it down your throat that it's "edgy". Now first of all I am not squeamish, I can put up with gore, with stuff that pushes the limits...if there is any point to it. Even the Saw franchise attempts to have some moral themes running through it and has that factor, "How would I get out of that?" But with this we watch some awful performances of people raping and mutilating each other without any point to it. It's not saying anything about anything. It's not Battle Royale, it's not Lord of the Flies, it has nothing to offer. But then the climax is simply baffling. After 45 mins of utter garbage the "villains" end up dead and the bunker is burning down. So our protagonist - who barely does anything for entire run time - abandons the survivors (one of which helped her defeat the bad guys and the other was her fiancé) and leaves them to burn to death while she escapes. Btw she escapes by breaking through the toilet, going into the sewer and climbing up outside.Question 1: Why did she abandon the other two? I get there was only one suit left, but not even a discussion? Just a quick conversation: one of them is injured and the other insane, she's the best candidate for survival. Simple. But no she just leaves. Question 2: When the hell did she figure out that escape route and why didn't she tell anyone about it? There's no quick scene of her figuring it out, she continues on like she planned it. So how long did she plan it for? Why not tell the others? Was it because of the white suited guys? If so, they never show up when she gets out.There isn't even the attempt of a twist when she does escape. She walks through the ruins, stop, we pan around and see more ruins. That's it? I've already explained how it can't have been a nuclear attack. If it was revealed to be aliens that would've been something, but no.Utter utter garbage, one of the worst movies I've ever seen.

This is a disturbing, thought-provoking, well-made film that has a huge fatal flaw to it. The characters are incredibly underwritten. This is a film that exemplifies the need to examine the characters life before the disaster occurs sending their life into a tail-spin. Unfortunately this film starts at the disaster, a nuclear explosion, before hinting at some of the characters pasts. And these are the only characters that we come to slightly know and care about. That is about 5 characters in a film where 9 characters play pivotal roles. And you only get to know those 5 characters slightly. The problem here is that 2/3 of the way through the movie is that the movie doesn't connect us with its characters. Its intention is to show the moral ambiguity of these characters and how they turn from civilized human beings to a "Lord of the Flies style group cannibalizing on the weaker members. And that's fine. I love "Lord of the Flies". But the director avoids allowing you to know the characters fully and that is a problem. If you don't know what the characters were like before hand, how can you be emotionally involved in where they end up? The director doesn't present the full spectrum here. Those who are given a slight backstory are very well played, especially by Rosanna Arquette as a mother who allows herself to be degraded to the worst possible degree in order to survive. But some of the characters are so thinly written that they begin psychotic and end up psychotic and you have no idea of what their connection is to any of the others or why they are there in the first place. And that is what hurts this film. You end up asking "Who are these people" 2/3 of the way through because you are not allowed to know them. It's a well made, well-acted film that trods along familiar lines but does so with intelligence. The problem is it doesn't want you to connect to it.

I'd heard about this for a long while before I finally got to see it. Wow, what a waste of time. I didn't care about the brutality or the way the humans in the film treated each other. That was about the only realistic part of this lame movie. From the opening scene where a woman is looking directly into a nuclear blast (she would have been blinded), to the unexplained soldiers who come in and kidnap a child, this film just gets dumber and dumber on every level possible. A few good performances are wasted by this idiotic, senseless story. Until I saw this, I thought Jericho was the dumbest post-nuclear show I'd seen. This is even dumber. See it if you must, but your life will be just as complete if you skip this silly film.