Some Thoughts On Quarantine

In light of 'Paranormal Activity', the mad-popularity of 'Cloverfield', and the upcoming Milla Jovovich starer 'The 4th Kind', first person-shot "big" movies are getting more and more popular. I can't even begin to say why, though.

Now, wait. This is not a negative review. However, it's not exactly a positive one, either. I actually enjoyed Quarantine, an American remake of a Spanish film called 'REC'. And to be fair, I have not seen Rec, despite hearing many good things about it. I was not at all interested in watching Quarantine, until I found the gorgeous and multi-talented Jennifer Carpenter is the lead star. Being a huge fan of Dexter, and having first noticed her (like most everyone else) in 'The Exorcism of Emily Rose', I had to see how she fared in her first real headlining role. She actually surpassed my expectations. Carpenter put a lot of effort into her role as a T.V. journalist, Angela Vidal, following a local fire department for a night for a video editorial she was putting together for her station, accompanied by her loyal cameraman, Scott.

The beginning of the movie is excellent. There are some genuinely funny scenes as the writers set up character development and future plot details. Here, we are introduced the fire crew, Angela's cameraman, and some minor plot details that will serve their purpose later in the film. Right as these scenes start to drag, the fire house gets a call and off they go to the most unforeseen hellish night of their lives.

The crew arrives at an apartment complex that had residents call in due to one their neighbors, an elderly woman, screaming bloody-murder. This is where the jump-from-your-seat scares begin. Now, unlike Paranormal Activity, this is all you get for scares. There is no real feeling of dread, and the spooky atmosphere the film tries to convey just doesn't work. It is set in an apartment builing, and as rustic as they try to make it look, in the end it is just an apartment building, and let's face it, apartments aren't scary. But if it's jump-scares your looking for, this film is loaded with 'em.

The razor-sharp wit that floated the first act of the movie is also nearly completely gone once they are in the complex as well, which is a real shame. The tenants and the rest of the cast fall into seriously familiar survival-horror territory as they begin to panic, despair, curse eachother and fight. Most of the film actually goes into formulaic horror storytelling from here. But don't let that fool you or stop you from watching this seriously entertaining movie.

As I said, this movie is absolutely chock-full of scares, and really good ones, too. If your a gore-hound, though, don't look here. It does have it moments of gruesomeness, but if you're seeking 'Hostel' type blood 'n guts, prepare to be disappointed. The first person camera aspect is done really well, too, as it should be: it's being shot as if a professional news cameraman is filming it, so there hardly any shaky-cam scenes, and the audio is always well placed, just like a real news cameraman.

What hurt this movie the most is it's star power. Okay, so we aren't exactly dealing with A-list celebrities here, but c'mon. Almost every fan of horror films is a fan of Dexter, the huge Showtime T.V. hit in which Jennifer Carpenter plays the sister of the title character. The lead firefighter role is played by Jay Hernandez of Hostel fame, and the apartment caretaker is played by Rade Serbedzija, a man who has been in countless movies, a few of them horror/thriller titles. What Paranormal Activity, Cloverfield, Blair Witch, etc., got right in their casting is what Quarantine got wrong: casting unknowns for the sake of anything could happen to them, without the viewer guessing, and it helps keep that 'it's real!' aspect. I spent half of the movie trying to figure where I had seen some of the other tenant's faces.

Another thing that hurt this movie for me is it's God-awful ending. Seriously, how predictable and unoriginal could you get? While the last 5-6 minutes are the most dread-filled (not to mention, Carpenter's best acting in the whole movie) the last 10 seconds had me so upset I wanted to put an axe through my screen. They seriously could not think of anything better other to follow the footsteps of every other "cam" movie before it? It was lazy writing, pure and simple. So much more could have been done. Oh well.

Bottom line? Quarantine is fun, in-it-for-the-scares-only movie. Don't read too much into the plot, expect a typical horror movie ending and you'll have a blast. As one IMDB reviewer said, "It's definitely not boring."

Thanks for reading.