Quarantine [DVD] [2008] [2009]

Quarantine follows a reporter and her cameraman tagging along with a fire crew to what they believe is a routine disturbance at a apartment block however upon arrival they find its anything but. attacked by a deranged woman infected with a mystery illness they find themselves sealed in by the CDC as the infections spreads what follows is a claustrophobic and tense battle for survival.

Kerching, the sound of Hollywood churning out another horror remake. Rec [2007] was a great surprise when it was released, appearing out of nowhere and proving to be a refreshingly scary ride. Within a year we have a remake in the vein of Funny Games [2007] and The Omen [2006] its more or less shot for shot.

There's a couple of new additions, extra scenes at the start in the fire station but these are simply padding adding nothing and ultimately slowing the pace of the film. Also the inclusion of the dog in the apartment building an interesting insertion but again ultimately adding nothing to the overall film.

Quarantine throws up a fair few good scares, directly ripped from Rec, the final scenes in the top floor apartment is utterly absorbing and horrifying likewise the pursuit by the creatures around the apartments is suitably tense and frantic. The camera style is borrowed straight from The Blair Witch Project [1999] and Cloverfield [2007] and like those films quarantine will split opinion if the shaky cam style does nothing for you quarantine certainly wont change your mind.

The central performances are decent enough, but the stars in Rec create a more genuine atmosphere and tension, to be perfectly honest Rec is the version to go for unless you hate subtitled films. If you haven't seen Rec add an extra star onto the score, as quarantine is an accomplished horror and genuinely chilling which cant be said about many of the current horror flicks, but for those of us who have its an all to familiar and underwhelming trip.

Quarantine is a very faithful - almost shot for shot, remake of the Spanish shaky-cam zombie flick. In fact, apart from being in English, the only differences that struck me were; leading lady Jennifer Carpenter is marginally less shrill and irritating than the original Spanish actress, the shaky-cam effect is slightly (thankfully!) less exaggerated here, as is the annoying strobe lighting sequence, the sound effects are more convincing (no ridiculous "bong!" when hitting a zombie with a fire-extinguisher and no silly twittering noise when rewinding the tape recorder) and the early scene-setting banter with the fire-fighters was slightly more drawn out.

But is that enough to justify this remake? Probably not. It's not as if the original was even a particularly good film! As has been stated many times, REC was a hugely derivative combination of Blair Witch meets 28 Days Later, full of clumsily telegraphed shocks. I think I rated REC as a 2-star movie and feel this remake is no better.

Unlike Carpenter's visceral remake of The Thing and Cronenberg's brilliantly brutal take on The Fly, this remake doesn't add enough to justify its worth and the planned extended franchise of REC/Quarantine sequels and prequels (yawn!) is something that really doesn't quicken my pulse!

To say 'Quarantine' is based on the Spanish classic 'Rec' would be like saying water is based on H20.

'Quarantine' is a solid shocker, but only because it's a virtual carbon copy of the superior Spanish version. 'Rec' Rec (Single Disc Edition) [DVD] just works better all round for me. The scares are scarier, the special effects more advanced, the acting slightly better and the tension all the more tense.

If you don't like subtitled films, then watch 'Quarantine' as it works well in its own right. If you genuinely want to see the better of the pair, then 'Rec' wins hands down every time (by the way 'Rec 2' is just as good and a neat follow on).

I don't want to go into a Hollywood rant, but 'Quarantine' is pretty lazy. It's like they thought we were somehow too stupid to understand the Spanish version and as such, needed our hands holding tightly through the production of an American re-make. There have been some great re-makes, but the key for me is to do something different to enhance the original. 'Quarantine' adds a couple of very minor changes, but apart from that duplicates the original frame by frame.

Of course, being a copy of a very good film, 'Quarantine' itself is very good; that goes without saying. If you built a carbon copy of the Winter Palace, that too would be an impressive building....you see where I coming from.

Worth watching, but I just had to knock a star off for lack of originality.