The Divide

The Divide follows eight residents of a New York apartment building who survive a catastrophic explosion by taking shelter in the basement. Their refuge was stocked by Mickey, the building's paranoid superintendent, and holds enough food and water to keep them alive for a while. When armed men in protective suits break into the shelter and open fire, the group manages to drive them off, though not without losses. Sealed inside and unsure who attacked them or why, the survivors find their cramped surroundings turning against them as fear, dwindling supplies and suspicion erode whatever held them together.

Xavier Gens directed the film from a screenplay by Karl Mueller and Eron Sheean. It was his third feature, arriving after Frontier(s) and Hitman, and it stands between those earlier films and later ones such as Cold Skin and Under Paris. The cast is led by Lauren German, Michael Biehn, Milo Ventimiglia, Courtney B. Vance, Ashton Holmes and Rosanna Arquette. Made for about 3 million dollars, the production was a German, Canadian and American co-production.

Audience reactions were mixed. On IMDb the film holds 5.7/10 from roughly 40,000 votes, and on TMDB it sits at 5.9/10 from a much smaller pool of 781 votes. Critics were harsher still, giving it 4.3/10 across 58 reviews, so the film found more tolerance among general viewers than among reviewers.