The Crimson Rivers (2000)

The French thriller The Crimson Rivers (2000) stars Jean Reno and Vincent Cassel. Detective Superintendent Pierre Niemans is sent to the small university town of Guernon in the French Alps to investigate a brutal murder. The victim, Remy Callois, was a professor and the university’s librarian. Niemans seeks out Dr. Cherneze, a local ophthalmologist, for an explanation about the removal of the victim’s eyes. According to Dr. Cherneze, the isolated setting of the school led to inbreeding among the professors, resulting in serious genetic disorders. However, this trend has recently reversed with village children falling ill while college babies remain healthy. The villagers blame this on the faculty members.

By chance, Detective Inspector Max Kerkerian was investigating the violation of Judith Herault’s grave and the theft of her photos from a nearby primary school in Sarzac. The mother informed Kerkerian that her family had been attacked by ‘demons’ during a trip to the hospital in Guernon, resulting in the death of her husband and daughter in a car accident. Niemans interviews Fanny Ferreira, a glaciologist, while also breaking into the deceased librarian’s office to discover information about the faculty’s past. He uncovers that the original faculty members were intellectuals who aimed to create a superior race based on intellect rather than physical traits, which ultimately led to their issues with inbreeding.