A nuclear blast? A foreign attack? An alien invasion? Just what sets off the debasing, cruel, absurd drama of Xavier Gens’ The Divide is not important. All that matters is that the movie’s scenario is set in motion: a rag-tag group of men with a couple of women are stranded in the basement of a New York apartment building, and it isn’t long before they are all behaving badly.

While the French director does manage to string together an energetic and inviting opening 20 minutes, it isn’t long until we realize that Gens’ movie isn’t so much populated with characters as it is monsters. The first is Mickey (Michael Biehn), the building superintendent, who has stocked the basement with food, anticipating the need for a fallout shelter. He is gruff, prickly, and violent. And after the space is invaded by mysterious agents in HAZMAT suits, who steal the only child in the group (thus clearing the way for the mother to become a sex slave), two of the other survivors decide to seize power from the disagreeable Mickey. One tyrant is replaced with two, and what follows is a long slog through sexual and physical torture.

The Divide‘s appeal is the same kind of thing that drew crowds to the Coliseum for animal fights. Brutal and vulgar, there is nothing but unleashed id in these characters, and the film’s nihilistic tone is so extreme that it becomes farcical. The only redeeming soul here is Eva (Lauren German) who must face a choice: stay cooped up with the vicious, blood-thirsty brutes, or escape to unknown surface by wading through raw sewage. Luckly, all we need to do is walk out the theater doors.