Review

Reporter Angela and her cameraman Scott are following L.A. Firefighters for an evening as they build footage for a reality television show. The crew they are following are called out to a medical emergency in an apartment block, but arriving at the building Angela and team discover the police are already on the scene.

After an attack on a police officer by a demented old lady, we quickly learn that the residents of the apartment building might be infected with a mutant strain of rabies that turns the infected into flesh-craving maniacs of the zombie kind. Shoot them in the head! Making matters worse for our intrepid reporter, the Authorities have sealed off the building and are shooting anyone "in the head!" who attempts to leave. Can Angela make it through the night?

It probably comes as no news to my average reader that Quarantine is a U.S. remake of the Spanish movie [Rec]. Unfortunately I had already dialled into the Spanish film and the U.S. trailers gave away the major shock scene of Quarantine, so it wasn't virgin territory for me. But I did appreciate U.S. attempts to help me avoid reading subtitles or in fact in even remotely having to check out anything from the "Foreign Movie" aisle of my local Blockbuster. If that sounds cynical then you are probably getting the major theme of this review; while thinking Quarantine is a mighty fine horror movie in its own right, I for one am getting sick and tired of the worn out Boredwood attempt to stay relevant in the horror market by dialling the lowest fracking common denominator into a movie. In essence, Quarantine exists because some filmmakers saw the opportunity to make some bucks off someone else's idea by pandering to the sort of audience who apparently are straining themselves if they have to read. Okay, let's knock this one over - hey, did I review [Rec] yet?

A decent zombie flick for people too stupid to read subtitles

Quarantine is another of those "found footage" flicks currently in vogue in the U.S. after the inordinate success of The Blair Witch Project. Hey, if Romero is doing it then it must be a legitimate method of filmmaking. And before anyone starts rabbiting on about how revolutionary all this is, hello Cannibal Holocaust, what's that you say The Stone Tapes? Yes, it's been done before, nothing new under the sun friends and neighbours. Having decided to take the cheap way out go with the whole "found footage" thing, [Rec] also runs with this device, director John Erick Dowdle is forced to go with the reality thing rather than relying on a large special effects budget and good old CGI. In the end "found footage" films rely on convincing the audience that they are witnessing "real" events, something Cloverfield singularly failed to do and hence why that movie slumped heavily at the box office after a surprisingly effective opening weekend.

Director Dowdle starts Quarantine on a low setting, giving the audience time to get to know his major characters and to dig their individual personalities. While applauding this approach, we see plenty of filmed sequences that would no doubt be hitting the editing floor prior to the actual "article going to air" there is one glaring error being made. Jennifer Carpenter, usually a very strong actress, simply can't play preppy! Her namesake in [Rec] pulled this off and was well cast, but Jennifer has a go at it and then drops it as the first act of the movie grinds on. Dowdle simply should have let Carpenter do her thing rather than trying to match the original Spanish film stroke for stroke. Jenny Carpenter aside, the whole first act of the movie is working like a zombie outbreak in a brain surgery department.

During the second act of Quarantine I got to appreciate just how good Dowdle was behind the camera. We are meant to not know what is happening and discover things at the same time as the characters, although as stated I had already caught up with [Rec] and the trailers gave away more spoilers then a lard bucket full of Harry Knowles,so was already ahead of the game. Having said that, one jump scene had me leaping out of my seat quicker than a Republican leaving a screening of the latest Mikey Moore Documentary. Effective, no preamble, wham bam thank you mam, great stuff! Dowdle keeps his infected coming at the audience in a similar fashion; there are no audio or visual clues going down, you are on your own throughout the film. What Dowdle does wonderfully well is use his primary location to great effect. Lights are dimmed, stairways are in darkness, and there's a whole gothic feeling to things. For sure the set designers basically reproduce the design used in [Rec], down to the iron balustrade, but it certainly is looking good.

As the audience gradually learn what is going down and what is behind events on screen, Dowdle ups the ante on the horror elements. There's a fair amount of claret being sprayed around, but the shock scenes really don't need it and you will be on the edge of your seat as the unaffected are gradually whittled down. Unfortunately for audiences the trailer gave away the major ending effect - what is it with Boredwood studio advertisers currently? - which had really nailed the coffin shut on the earlier Spanish movie. It's like when you have already seen the major scare scene in Ring involving the television; the impact is diminished in subsequent viewings. Dowdle doesn't get to hand in a knock out punch, which is perhaps the only issue I had with the Director; he needed something new that had not already been covered in [Rec] to finish his audience off with.

Jennifer Carpenter (Angela) has to pretty much carry Quarantine on her own with some help from minor cast members. Carpenter doesn't ring true as the glee club cheerleader at the start of the film but she nails things when the blood hits the fan. You can readily believe Angela is a presenter who has bitten off more than she can chew. At no stage does Carpenter go Ripley on us, in fact she almost verges on Barbara circa Night of the Living Dead at stages. Steve Harris (Scott Percival) wasn't exactly ringing my bell but then again there wasn't much meat on the bone for Harris to get down and dirty with. Jury out, friends and neighbours.

Zero to report on the T&A front, though it's made up for to some degree by some pretty effective makeup and the notion that you just might be watching a zombie flick. Okay that trade off might be working just for me, but hey it's my call anyways, go write your own review if you disagree.

For once a film that didn't feel the need to add a score. It's all down to incidental noises, sound bites, and some pretty chilling groans and moans from off screen. Pretty atmospheric stuff end of day, good decision not to dilute things with a score. Thankfully no fracking rap friends and neighbours.

Even taking into account that I had already seen [Rec], I still had mucho fun times in country with Quarantine. Director Dowdle threw on a pretty effective and atmospheric horror thrill ride that had me jumping in places. Excellent demonstration of how to scare the shite out of your audience without the need to duck down to the torture chamber to hit people over the head with mountains of gore. Will be interesting to see what Dowdle can come up with next, as it's going to take a pretty good film to top Quarantine.

Naturally there will be some debate as to whether or not Quarantine actually fits into the zombie subgenre. I'm going with a big "hell yeah"; modern zombie flicks are all about the affected developing sudden appetites for human flesh, and the affected in Quarantine develop exactly what appetite again? I don't hold with the purist argument that a zombie has to be a resurrected dead person, that's a Romero take on the genre that doesn't necessarily inform every "zombie" movie out there. For the record, the "undead" were originally vampires anywise and not lumbering zombies.

I still reckon you should go and catch [Rec] but if foreign films aren't your thing then dial into Quarantine. Both movies are a return to what horror is meant to be about, scaring the poo out of people, so fair crack of the whip, either is worth a look. Remember the cool kids have all seen [Rec], the dweebs have only seen Quarantine, your call on which movie to score. Lap up some horror kids, Quarantine is the real deal!