Movie - Quarantine

[Ridah]

Thanks to Netflix instant streaming on my 360, I watch a lot more movies. I remember previews for this but I thought it was a Blair Witch rip-off, I watched Quarantine last night and fucking-A was it scary! Seriously, turn the lights off and crank the sound. If you want to jump watch this movie.

[leo8877]

Interesting, I'll have to check it out.

[El-Producto]

I preferred the original REC, but thankfully they did basically a shot for shot remake.

[Chaz]

The only thing I disliked about it:

Spoiler for Ending Spoiler:

was that the final shot of the movie was what they used for the poster.  Asinine.

I keep meaning to watch REC but haven't gotten to it yet.

[Autistic Angel]

Anyone planning to see Quarantine should make sure to watch [REC] first.  Everyone I know who tried it in reverse came away disappointed that they let the inferior remake spoil the experience.

El-Producto is right is that Quarantine is nearly a shot-for-shot remake, but it's just..."off" somehow.

-Autistic Angel

[Crawley]

Yeah I heard Rec is the better movie but Quarantine was a nice surprise and I enjoyed it. Rec 2 is on the way at some point.

[CeeKay]

The only thing I disliked about it:

Spoiler for Ending Spoiler:

was that the final shot of the movie was what they used for the poster.  Asinine.

I keep meaning to watch REC but haven't gotten to it yet.

and that was in the commercials too.  overall I don't think anything creeped me out in this movie like the tent scene with the sounds of kids outside in Blair Witch.

[gellar]

I absolutely hated this movie.

gellar

[Kurt Stevens]

I preferred the original REC, but thankfully they did basically a shot for shot remake.

+1   I almost always enjoy original foriegn films more than their english remakes.   I just have a hard time getting my wife to watch anything with subtitles.  She doesn't want to "read" a movie. 

[whiteboyskim]

I absolutely hated this movie.

gellar

Ditto. I spent the movie laughing at how awful it was. Any attempt to focus on it seriously for more than three minutes at a time resulted in laughter. The camera kill, for the record, was awesome. Beyond that? Fail.

[hepcat]

I haven't had the heart to watch the remake.  The original was so darn good (especially the infamous end scene which creeped me out more than any other movie in the last 5 years...including Paranormal Activity) that I want to remember that and not some glitzy hollywood remake.

[Ridah]

I thought they did a really good job with the zombies (or whatever you want to call them). The make-up, the sound effects, and the way they attacked people was well done. The best part about it was you got to experience a lot of it in first-person view.

[hepcat]

hmmm...well perhaps I'll give it a shot.  it seems to still be up on the netflix instant watch list.

[Ironrod]

Completely off topic, this thread title keeps reminding me of my wife's freshman student who missed class because he was "corunteened with the flew." (Yes, English is Corunteen Boy's native language.)

[whiteboyskim]

Completely off topic, this thread title keeps reminding me of my wife's freshman student who missed class because he was "corunteened with the flew." (Yes, English is Corunteen Boy's native language.)

That seriously sounds like a great name for a band.

[Ironrod]

Completely off topic, this thread title keeps reminding me of my wife's freshman student who missed class because he was "corunteened with the flew." (Yes, English is Corunteen Boy's native language.)

That seriously sounds like a great name for a band.

Well then I should admit that I misspelled it. "Corrunteen" has two Rs. (duh)

[Blackjack]

I finally caught Quarantine on Netflix streaming last night. My brief thoughts:

Pros:
-The camera kill
-When Jennifer Carpenter finally covers her mouth and stops her incessant, annoying hyperventilation-screaming late in the movie, it does imho result in a few genuinely tense, suspenseful moments.
-I do think there are some cool, tense moments where the camera can't fully see what's going on or whether someone's just sick or a, basically, zombie.

Cons:
-The camera bobbing up and down like the camera-guy is bouncing on a trampoline is both exasperating and ridiculous. I think even in 2008, the camera a pro would use would probably have some sort of stability-assist.
-The first 10-15 minutes in the fire station just seems to go on and on and on and on. And only two firefighters play a role in the film so why spend so much time there? I fast forwarded...
-Too many Nobody actors playing characters you know nothing about, screaming and yelling bad dialogue at each other over and over. For me, when they shut up, and you're left tensing up at what the camera viewfinder might pick up (i.e., letting the picture tell the story, not bad dialogue screamed at you), is when the film gets closer to being what it could've been.

-The Ending

Spoiler for Hiden:

I'm just not a big fan of "everybody dies" movie endings, especially within the found-footage genre. What's the point? I like having one survivor left to be a witness to what happened, or at least some explanation how the found footage found its way to someone who saved it, viewed it, broadcast it, etc.

And I didn't see the point of the last minute discovery some nut job in the attic was developing some mega-virus. I was actually OK with the idea of some Cujo-like rabidness gone viral. The ending instead with the nut and this mega-zombie up there seemed almost like the ending of The Last Exorcism, veering too far off course to try to shock the audience.

btw, one of the streaming services offers the original Rec but it's a horribly, comically dubbed-in-English version. I found the out of synch dubbing made it unwatchable and gave up after a few minutes.

If Quarantine was a shot-for-shot remake, I don't really see how .rec could be better unless the actors were less annoying and maybe the lead actress (Jennifer Carpenter's counterpart) in .rec doesn't spend the last 1/3 of the movie screaming-hyperventilating.  

[metallicorphan]

I have only seen REC 1 and 2,and enjoyed them(original Spanish Soundtrack)

If i see this i will give it a watch,but again i am not really a fan of remakes for Western/English sake

I have a lot of the Japanese Horrors,and just seem to enjoy them more(Ring,Dark Water,The Grudge)


I watched 'The Girl' trilogy the other day and enjoyed them(well the first two were good,the last one was so-so),not seen the Fincher/Craig remake

[hepcat]

I know it's sacrilege around these parts, but I preferred the original Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.  Rapace just seemed to occupy that role like it was her own.  There was something just off about Rooney Mara that distracted me in her turn as the character.  I didn't get that same, raw feel from her that Rapace gave me.

[Blackjack]

While battling heat-related insomnia (the low here in Virginia is like 80 something these days), I caught Quarantine 2 (a direct-to-DVD film) -- at least most of it, as I skipped through some parts that shaped up as boring -- on Crackle. My deep thoughts with Jack Handey...

Pros:
-The injection needle (on purpose) right under the eyeball. I know full well it was prosthetics but man, that was squirm-inducing.  
-The sequel ditches the found-footage motif altogether so you can for the most part always see what's happening. There's a fair amount of hand-camera work but not much obnoxious bobbing and weaving.
-Actress (Mercedes Masöhn) playing flight attendant heroine did not -- for the most part -- resort to Jennifer Carpenter's obnoxious hyperventilation-screaming, was appealing, and was even at times resourceful or brave.
-There's a purposeful hook into the first film that makes sense, even if I wasn't crazy about the first film's ending plot device per se.
-I can't say I got to Know the characters much, but I found these characters more appealing than in the first film. I rooted for them a bit, and felt a little bad about some of their fates.
-Most importantly...

Spoiler for Hiden:

Someone lives at the end! So for a change, it's not a totally nihilistic, "everyone dies" type ending.

Cons:
-As with Quarantine 1, or even Prometheus, can we have a moritorium on people putting their faces close to something they clearly know is going to bite, eat or otherwise attack them?  
-I think the movie's at its best in the claustrophobic environs on the plane. Although I think the earlier "Flight of the Living Dead: Outbreak on a Plane" (2007) did it better.  
-A few segments I just found tedious and didn't do much as far as building characters or anything, so I found myself forwarding certain stretches in the early and middle parts of the movie.
-I still feel like the movies miss how nowadays, something like this would result in the passengers posting a zillion movies and pix on YouTube, social networks and video/photo sharing services before any government agency could shut things down. I think just a couple minutes exploring that angle would've been neat and realistic to how things happen today with major events/catastrophes.

P.S. From what I read online, Quarantine 2 was not a remake of Rec 2 or anything else.

[Crawley]

Yeah I felt it was just ok too.

[Blackjack]

I caught Rec 2 on Crackle (subtitles, no lousy Englilsh dubbing) last night. In some ways I liked it, in some ways I feel like it jumps the shark and goes too far away from Rec's initial biohazard-type premise. Basically I'm saying, I don't think ....

Spoiler for Hiden:

Jumping off into Exoricst territory was the best idea because for most of Rec/Quarantine I felt kinda gripped because the story seemed like something that could happen. Once it's whackjob priest with a voice recognition communicator and hordes of demonic flesh eating kids, it lost me in the believability quotient.

I also don't understand sending a squad of 3-4 troops into a multi-story building? Why not just flood the sucker with 100 troops and clear it floor by floor? Yeah I know, they didn't have the movie budget.  

And yes, the inevitable "idiot must put his face within 6 inches of someone that's going to clearly rip his face off." I guess I shoud stop complaining about that since it seems a necessity in all zombie/alien/monster movies. All supporting characters should just wear a sandwich board that says in big letters, "I AM AN IDIOT AND I AM GOING TO STICK MY FACE 6 INCHES FROM SOMEONE OR SOMETHING THAT'S GONNA EAT MY FACE." Maybe that won't fit on one side of a sandwich board.  

To like?
-the best moments with the view shifting between the several troops' cameras reminds me of Aliens, and that's always a good thing, right?
-imho the First Person Shooter sequences are pretty awesomely done.
-Plenty of "BOO!" moments.
-The initial segment of the movie seems to use a very stabilized hand-cam (carried by a soldier I think), which made me happy. Eventually though it switches to bobbling, weaving, "camera guy jumping on a trampoline" mode. Sigh.
-Likewise, early on, people are quiet enough to get some suspense from listening to sounds. Eventually it returns to "Dumb characters screaming and yelling as loudly as possible at each other over and over and over." I don't find that that sort of thing tells a story, builds empathy for the characters or is even entertaining. It's just obnoxious, and you end up not being able to hear other things in the background.

So I'd say, Rec 2 (2010) is OK but I can kind of see why in the U.S. they chose not to replicate it. Even though they connect it with Rec pretty well (it's just supposed to take place 15 minutes after Rec's finale), it's almost like Alien 3 or 4 to me --- I'd prefer to think it didn't happen. I'd rather let my imagination figure out where the story went after Rec/Quarantine, rather than that ...

Spoiler for Hiden:

Oh! The lady news reporter gets a giant satanic worm maggot thing spat down her throat and it possesses her! That's exactly where I wanted to see the story go! NOT...