Quarantine (www.the-usher.com)

"The people have to know what went on here!"

When TV Reporter Angela Vidal (Carpenter) is assigned to follow LA fire fighter Jake (Hernandez) for the night shift, she thinks that this might just be her big career break. Little did she know that the first call of the night would something that no one would have expected? When she and her cameraman Scott (Harris) arrive on the scene with fire fighters, they are called to an upstairs apartment of an elderly resident who was heard screaming earlier but when they investigate, the old woman attacks them in a brutal, almost animalistic fashion. With a police officer and a fire fighter critically injured, Angela, Jake and Scott try to lead the rest of the residents of the apartment block out to safety, only to find that the military have surrounded the building, started sealing it up and shooting anyone who tries to leave.

As Hollywood continues to struggle to come up with new ideas, it turns to European filmmakers again for an injection of originality but why do they have to do shot for shot remakes?

When 'Rec' was released in Spain in 2007, it was instantly lauded as one of the best and most terrifying horror movies of that year. This, of course, drew the attention of Hollywood. Continuing to think that American audiences will not watch anything with subtitles and in one of the fastest turnarounds in recent years, 'Rec' was remade as a shot for shot copy with American talent and location replacing its Spanish origins. The problem is that it doesn't really have the same impact.

When 'The Blair Witch Project' was released in 1999, it was expected that a glut of movies seen through the lens of a cameraperson would flood the horror genre but this didn't really happen, with even the film's appalling sequel returning to the traditional third person view. It wasn't until 'Cloverfield', 'Diary of the Dead' and 'Rec' it self came along in 2007 and 2008 that movies filmed from the first person, point of view from the cameraperson became popular again. 'Quarantine' takes this approach in the same way as these films did but because these films had come before, all of the originality has been removed but there are some good moments here.

The story is a simple one. Television reporter Angela Vidal and her cameraman are following a night shift with a Los Angeles Fire Station crew, when they are called to an incident at a downtown apartment building. When they arrive they discover what they think is a routine call turns into a nightmare when the building is sealed off by the CDC (Centre for Disease Control) and now one is allowed to leave. On further investigation, Angela and the fire-fighters discover that one of the residents have become infected with something that resembles an extreme version of rabies, which turns the infected into ravenous killers. This is nothing new, of course, but the claustrophobic setting of the apartment block and the sheer panic of knowing that you cannot escape made the original such a fright fest.

Where the film succeeds is in the casting. Here we don't really have any superstar names, with filmmakers relying on actors that you have heard of, from TV and film, thus meaning that anyone can meet a grizzly end. With the exception of the cameraman, who you know is going to survive as long as possible as he as to record it, Jennifer Carpenter, Jay Hernandez, Johnathon Schaech, Greg Germann, Dania Ramirez and Rade Serbedzija are all open to becoming rabies driven killing machines.

'Quarantine' would have been an excellent piece of survival horror, if it hadn't have been a straight remake of the original Spanish movie. Hollywood has to understand that they need to concentrate on producing original material instead of just remaking everything.

PICTURE & SOUND

The Blu-Ray disc presents the movie in High Definition wide screen 1:85 up to 1080p, with Dolby TrueHD 5.1 surround sound.

BONUS FEATURES

Commentary with writer/director John Erick Dowdle and writer/producer Drew Dowdle
The brothers provide an informative and fun commentary for 'Quarantine'. They talk about the problems they encountered filming in the first person, improvising the fear and creating the tension. This is a decent commentary from two up and coming filmmakers.

Locked In: The Making of Quarantine (10.05 mins/Standard Definition)
Director/co-writer John Erick Dowdle, executive producer Drew Dowdle, cinematographer Ken Seng, executive producer Glen S. Gainor and stars Jennifer Carpenter, Jay Hernandez, Johnathon Schaech, Greg Germann and Dania Ramirez take you behind the scenes of the making of 'Quarantine'. The featurette takes you through the process of making a movie with a single camera, trying to shoot in real time and the improvisation of the cast.

Dressing the Infected: Robert Hall's Makeup Design (7.29 mins/Standard Definition)
Director/co-writer John Erick Dowdle, executive producer Drew Dowdle, executive producer Glen S. Gainor and special effects supervisor Robert Hall reveal how the infected were created for the movie.

Anatomy of a Stunt (3.23 mins/Standard Definition)
Director/co-writer John Erick Dowdle and stunt co-ordinator Lance Gilbert reveal how the stairwell fall scene was created.

Trailers
Previews of 'Resident Evil: Degeneration', 'Lakeview Terrace', 'Terminator Salvation' and 'The International' BD Live Place the Blu-Ray disc into an Internet enabled player or PS3 and have access to further promotional material.

OVERALL

The Blu-Ray treatment for 'Quarantine' is one that fans will enjoy. The commentary is good and the featurettes cover most aspects of the film's production. It is a shame that the disc doesn't really embrace the new technology as much however, as this is just the same as the DVD release.

BLU-RAY

Rec

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2008