Robert Toupin Movies

Director Pascal Lauguier follows his 2004 thriller House of Voices with this relentlessly brutal tale of a girl who suffered unimaginable abuse as a young child, and the unspeakable horrors that unfold when she arrives at an isolated cabin in the woods fifteen years later. The story begins as the young, badly battered Lucie (Mylène Jampanoï) -- obviously the victim of inhuman abuse -- is hospitalized after somehow managing to escape her sadistic captors. Nearly catatonic after her life-altering ordeal, Lucie only manages to become functional again as a result of her friendship with Anna (Morjana Alaoui), a fellow abuse victim who selflessly reaches out to the badly damaged girl. Fifteen years later, Lucie guns down an entire family in cold blood. Is Lucie seeking belated vengeance against the people who tortured her as a young girl, or has her fragile psyche finally snapped, resulting in the bloody demise of an innocent family? Later, when Lucie calls on her old friend Anna, the truth about Lucie's traumatic early life experience slowly comes into focus. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

People are disappearing all over the Big Apple. Nobody cares, though, because most of the missing are homeless. But when investigative reporter Murphy (J.C. Quinn) tips off principled photographer George Cooper (John Heard) to a government conspiracy involving the dumping of nuclear waste beneath the streets, Cooper decides to dig a little deeper. Soon he discovers the existence of C.H.U.D.s, or "Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers," derelicts who have become grotesque monsters after being exposed to the mountains of hazardous waste. Meanwhile, Captain Bosch (Christopher Curry), a cop whose wife is among the missing, forms an unlikely alliance with the Reverend (Daniel Stern), a leftist soup-kitchen cook who knows the score. Murphy, Cooper, Bosch, and the Reverend soon run up against the stonewalling tactics of Wilson (George Martin), a government toadie. As the titular monsters begin to tire of their underground habitat, the protagonists -- including Cooper's wife, beautiful model Lauren Daniels (Kim Greist) -- face a race against time to defeat not only the C.H.U.D.s, but the government's cover-up. The debut, and only film, from writer Parnell Hall and director Douglas Cheek, C.H.U.D. was followed by 1989's C.H.U.D. 2: Bud the C.H.U.D. Co-stars Stern and Heard would later appear together in the first two Home Alone pictures, while Curry would appear in the third. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi