By Linda Winsh-Bolard
Remake of a Spanish film called “Rec.”(2007) , sadly not a good remake.
The introduction, where a young reporter Angie (Jennifer Carpenter) is working on a story about LA firefighters (she will shadow one crew for the night) is long, simplistic and serves no purpose except establishing that Angie works with a cameraman, Scott (Steve Harris), who shoots everything in sight. And so he will through out the night, with occasional lack of picture but ever going sound. The firemen are called to a building where an unresponsive woman is sick; she attacks one of the men. They call for police and ambulance. To their surprise the evacuation of the building is halted. Instead, the combined governmental forces lock and barricade everybody in, refuse any explanation and shoot those who want to leave. Later, staff from Center for Disease Control arrives, and get infected while taking a sample the disease, which resembles fast acting rabies. The infection spreads. It is a classic lock room horror. Albeit, it will never make a classic film.
Disjointed images, accompanied by cheap sound effects, fill the screen in order to save on SGI. As the endless, repetitive screams, shaky camera, eternal darkness, in and out focus repeated itself ad nausem, along with exactly the same attacks by seemingly endless occupants of the building (three of the same within 60 seconds) I stopped being bored, I started to get mad. I got the idea an hour ago, either develop it, or let me leave.
All the usual is there: yelling women, bare female legs, crotch shots, bulky men, raving dogs and endless hysteria. Blink in, fade to black, another extreme close up, fade in –fade out- give me a break. This place is as devoid of candles, matches, lighters and simple medical kits as it is devoid of logic Heavy breathing fills the film like the cheapest of pornography- it never occurred to the director that even very upset, or physically exhausted humans calm down rather soon- it saves their hearts and lungs.
A word of advice: your actress is the only person in the world waving open arms around, while crouching, when she is moving in the dark. After watching this for an intermediate length of time, with Angie diligently screaming and heavily breathing , I was ready to bash her head in.
Also for the record, once and for all: parents, both parents, abandon their children in extreme life threatening situations because all organisms have built in self preservation mode. It kicks in when leaving a child behind means that the parents would live. Screaming mothers protecting infectious, biting daughters are a figment of imagination. A nasty, repetitive one, overused to move forward shallow repetitive actions.
Having said all that, how is it possible that the film earned second place on financial ladder during the opening weekend?
Easily. It resonates with what people perceive as their personal experiences. They know that when disaster strikes, their government will more likely isolate and shoot them than help them. They understand that there is no “community” to turn to. If things go wrong, they are alone. Having seen, or experienced that, they want to see it on a big screen. There is that moment when the media is told by the government officials that everybody in the building was evacuated…
It does not matter that the film is hastily put together slapdash of Night of the Living Dead, The Blair Witch Project, The Diary of the Dead and Cloverfield. What matters is that it is closer to known reality than the polished but detached Body of Lies. Nobody believes that the government cares even as much as Body of Lies shows; hence nobody sees it as a portrait of reality. Quarantine, on the other hand, strikes a known cord.
Impotent rage, fear of the unknown, distrust-the pandemonium of confused people who feel betrayed by all of the institutions supposedly protecting them; that is after all a stamp of this year’s production. Forty seven horrors produced in Hollywood alone. Monsters, diseases, mass killers. Still, the screen has troubles to trumpet real life. Quarantine is neither original nor well executed, it’s familiar. What does it mean when a nation finds familiar zombies comforting?
It probably means that some big shot is going to re-make it. Since we had already seen the idea, it is going to be just as boring as this version, if for different reasons.
Directed by John Erick Dowdle, Camera : Ken Seng, Written by Drew and John Erick Dowdle ,With: Jennifer Carpenter, Jay Hernandez, Columbus Short, Greg Germann, Steve Harris, Dania Ramirez, Rade Sherbedgia, Jonathon Schaech
