For any genre fanatic, the names Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo should ring familiar. After breaking out with 2007’s gory masterpiece Inside, the duo continued working together over the years on a variety of exciting projects within the horror realm. From Among the Living to Leatherface to Kandisha and The Deep House, Maury and Bustillo’s films are always noteworthy and properly nasty, marking exciting voices in the foreign sphere of spooky filmmaking. Now, their newest, The Soul Eater, presents a bold vision of mystery and suspense, as only Maury and Bustillo could pull off convincingly. Blending multiple subgenres and teeming with bold imagery, this tightly-scripted thrill ride will have viewers on the edge of their seats.
Two polar opposite investigators are on a mission to solve cases of mysterious deaths and child disappearances, somehow connected by ominous threads of coincidence. We first meet “department of alarming disappearances” investigator Franck De Rolan (Paul Hamy), trying to carpool on his way to the sleepy town of Roquenoir. Armed with unnerving information about potential connections, his research has led him to the same place as Commander Elisabeth Guardiano (Virginie Ledoyen), whose focus is on the horrifying adult murders rather than the disappearances. Early on, we follow the duo as they end up at one ghastly crime scene after another. The nasty aftermath of each event only emphasizes the pattern Franck has been following all along; Franck discovers a tiny figurine with horns that apparently represents this town’s boogeyman, called the Soul Eater.
The legend of this Soul Eater permeates the picture from the very beginning, as childlike whispers of one who feasts on souls are recounted. Later, a cop recalls this local legend in detail—they say the Soul Eater resides in the skin of those one loves. There must be a logical explanation behind these occurrences, and both Franck and Elisabeth will not rest until they uncover the truth. The Soul Eater definitely feels different from other Maury and Bustillo movies, existing in the realms of procedural and psychological thriller rather than straight-up gory slaughter. An eventual reveal near the conclusion also makes another pivot, altering the very fabric of what I had assumed would be a striking burst of supernatural horror.
As with the duo’s previous movies, the carnage eventually arrives in a serious way. Slick practical efforts work does its job, aiding in an eerie atmosphere. However, it may be worthy of noting that those expecting big scares and chilling moments will find themselves faced with a decidedly different brand of terror. This will hit a little too close to home for some, but for me, it definitely helped differentiate from the flood of horror injected into my veins on the regular. The Soul Eater rides the high of Maury and Bustillo’s pedigree for spine-tingling horror, threading a harrowing mystery through their gritty lens of brutality.
The Soul Eater screened at 2024’s Fantasia International Film Festival.
