The Decline 2020

Antoine [Guillaume Laurin], his female partner, and their young daughter begin a tense drill, practicing an emergency home evacuation and grabbing a “bug-out bag” of essentials, timing every move with quiet precision as winter snow closes in around them.

The following day, the family watches a survivalist training video on food preservation created by Alain [Réal Bossé], a charismatic, middle‑aged survivalist with a magnetic pull. When he invites Antoine to join a multi‑day training session at his remote cabin, Antoine heads out alone through the biting cold, crossing an empty, snowbound landscape to reach the isolated camp where he finally meets Alain.

Alain has built a remarkably self‑sufficient enclave: a sturdy cabin, a green greenhouse, chicken coops, a generator, solar panels, and a bank of batteries that keep the lights on in a place far from modern conveniences. As the days unfold, more enthusiasts arrive: Rachel [Marie‑Evelyne Lessard], a former soldier; Sébastien [Guillaume Cyr], a hunting‑oriented man; Anna [Marilyn Castonguay], François [Marc‑André Grondin], and David [Marc Beaupré], a figure with a paramilitary edge. The group settles into a rhythm of instruction and meal breaks, moving between the cabin and the large tent that serves as their shared dormitory as they learn the camp’s routines.

Alain takes the lead, guiding them through handgun and rifle drills, setting snares for small game, performing field dressing, and tending the greenhouse’s crops. The atmosphere is punctuated by long conversations in which Alain lays out his survivalist philosophy. He tells the students that they are prime examples of what he calls a “lucid citizen”, capable of sustaining themselves if society ever collapses, and he plants the idea that Antoine should consider staying on at the camp in the future.

Tension deepens as the training pushes into dangerous territory: building pipe bombs as a contingency in a potential social collapse, with Alain warning that if waves of violence arrive—“migrants with machetes,” as he implies—rifles alone might not be enough. After a test detonation, misfortune strikes when François is killed as a crate of bombs explodes, turning the camp into a scene of panic and moral debate.

Despite the gravity of the accident, most students want to alert authorities, but Alain and David refuse, fearing charges of domestic terrorism or manslaughter that would ruin the camp’s future. The meeting adjourns, and the group tries to sleep, hoping for clarity in the morning. Quietly, a bright light pulses from inside the tent, and when dawn comes, they discover Alain has burned François’s body with gasoline. After a bitter confrontation, many students attempt to flee on snowmobiles, but David shoots Antoine in the chest, ending his involvement in the nightmare.

Rachel engages in a fierce confrontation with David, ultimately killing him in close combat. She returns to the cabin to find Anna has died, and she sets the greenhouse ablaze, moving to the upper floor to watch for Alain armed with the assault rifle. Alain arrives on a snowmobile to find the campus in chaos, with two dead bodies at the parking area. As he nears the cabin, Rachel fires, pinning him down, and a brutal hand‑to‑hand fight ensues. The survivalist’s old rhetoric—his creed about self‑reliance and endurance—echoes in the background as Rachel gains the upper hand. She loads the wounded man onto a sled attached to the snowmobile and drives away, leaving the camp to burn behind her.