#11: Quarantine (2008)

"They won't let us out."

Late night television reporter Angela Vidal (Jennifer Carpenter), accompanied by her cameraman Scott (Steve Harris), is on assignment at a Los Angeles fire department, following the nightly routine of two firemen (played by Jay Hernandez and Johnathon Schaech) when the station receives an emergency call. Arriving at an old apartment building, the superintendent directs the firemen, news crew, and a pair of policemen to the second floor, where an elderly tenant in considerable distress (her screams alone have managed to rouse several of the building's other tenants) has locked herself within her apartment. Breaking down the door reveals a terrified old woman- barely able to communicate- her clothes stained with blood . . . and apparently not her own.

Fairly soon it's obvious to everyone involved that the best course of action would be to leave- but the front doors have been blocked from the outside, cell-phones don't work, and any attempt to exit the building is met with violent force from the authorites- who insist that the people inside stay put.

I have to admit, when I saw the trailer for this film (which, if you didn't already know, is a remake of the 2007 Spanish film REC) I didn't expect much. It looked like yet another attempt to cash-in on the "Blair Witch" found footage genre, and when compared to the hype surrounding the same year's Cloverfield, Quarantine gave off the vibe of being the inferior of the two films. Imagine my great surprise when I picked it up on DVD and had my socks blown off by it (I mean, not literally, but, you know . . .)

I actually think the film's rather tepid opening is ingenious. Normally this would be the portion of the story that would make us sympathize with the leads, and give you information that will later become important- but instead we are confronted by characters that aren't particularly likable, or even well developed- even Angela, our main character, comes off as a bit of an intellectual lightweight, and I can't imagine the fictional late-night program that she and Scott are supposedly filming is anything but fluff revolving around a pretty young woman. Multiple people I've watched this with have commented to the effect that they can't wait for these people to die, and I think its a testament to this film's structure that, by the end of the film, you really really really want them to make it out alive.

The opening also has exposition that literally has nothing to do with anything that later occurs! Take for instance the time spent discussing the old-fashioned hook ladder. In a normal movie, this would have become an 11th hour plot twist, possibly even the means by which our heroes would ultimately escape the apartment building- here, it seems placed to make us think that we know where the plot going, and I applaud any attempt to shake up predictable film conventions.

Admittedly, Quarantine does take awhile to get up to speed, but when it does it plays out like pure nightmare fuel. It would be frightening enough if it only dealt with the experience of being trapped inside of a building by the government with no explanation, so adding what are essentially the world's most believable zombies into the mix ramps up the horror aspect considerably. The last fifteen minutes of this film are absolutely terrifying . . . make sure you watch it in the dark.

Check back later for #10!

Update: I really do have a lot of beef with the trailer- I would have been a lot more likely to go see this film if they had just let me know that it was a zombie flick, and I certainly think its completely unforgivable that it actually shows us the ending of the film! What were they thinking?