Review: Night of the Hunted (1980)

(aka La Nuit des Traquées)
Directed by: Jean Rollin
Starring: Brigitte Lahaie, Vincent Gardère, Dominique Journet
Written by: Jean Rollin
Music by: Philippe Bréjean
Country: France
Available on: Blu-ray/DVD (Redemption/Kino Lorber)
IMDb

Imagine a film set in a stark, clinically appointed urban apartment tower, populated by people that had been exposed to a nuclear disaster that is slowly erasing their memories and motor function, first reducing them to pure id and eventually leaving them as nothing but breathing husks. Imagine they’re trapped in this tower against their will by doctors looking for a cure at any cost, doctors who coldly euthanize them once they’re a liability. Imagine a film for which David Cronenberg did all the pre-production, then handed it off to Jean Rollin to film over nine days with the budget of a porno and you’re probably imagining Night of the Hunted. That last sentence is only half-true: Cronenberg had nothing to do with this (though there are major Shivers vibes throughout), but Rollin was indeed hired to direct a porn film and used the minuscule budget/time instead to riff on the emptiness of life without his favorite things: memory and nostalgia. In that way, this is a very unique entry in his filmography, because the concept, by its nature, keeps him from doting on his usual topics. Though Night of the Hunted ultimately feels undeveloped, hindered by its incredibly tight budget and production schedule, it’s still fascinating to see how an aesthete with a tendency toward the gothic interprets metropolitan frigidity through such a cerebral concept. Rollin once again casts Brigitte Lahaie as the lead, and she’s absolutely striking, carrying the film despite its sparse dialog and plotting. I was a little distracted by how much Vincent Gardère looks like David Naughton — however, no appearances from spectral best friends that are horribly mutilated. But I digress. Like many of Rollin’s films, I found myself unsure how much I liked it in the immediate aftermath, only to find later that its elemental allure had seeped into my brain folds. What initially seemed like a pleasant but trifling and kind of inertia-less detour now strikes me as a rich meditation on what could possibly remain of our humanity without our memories. Though Rollin is no stranger to endings that stick with you, Night of the Hunted features perhaps his most poignant, beautiful, and hopeful.

Overall rating: 8.5 out of 10