Leprechaun 2 - Horror Film Review

As I have mentioned in a previous post; I have recently gotten the Leprechaun box set which has the first 5 films (yet not the 6th one for some reason). Leprechaun 2 again stars Warwick Davis as a psychotic Leprechaun, yet seems to be totally unrelated to the first film.

Every 1000 years a Leprechaun has one chance to get a bride via magical means.  After being foiled in Ireland the Leprechaun vows to return in a 1000 years time to get the ancestor of the man who foiled him as a bride.  1000 years later the Leprechaun appears in a City in America (maybe New York or Los Angeles?) where he has traced the girl he plans to marry. However during his kidnapping of the girl, the girls boyfriend ends up with one of the Leprechauns golden coins.  Before the wee fellow can retire and make little Leprechaun babies with his new bride he must retrieve his golden coin.

Like the previous film the plot is pretty terrible, and again seems to outstay its welcome despite being under an hour and a half in length.  The location this time of a big city means potentially more victims, yet there again does not seem to be many deaths, I think in total there were about 5 or 6, though some were quite inventive! One in particular sees a man going to kiss what he thinks is a ladies chest, but is in reality 2 spinning blades.

The Leprechaun appears to have more powers than the previous film.  He is not only able to imitate peoples voices, but now is able to summon illusions of people, as well as change himself to look like people.  He is still able to quickly assemble vehicles, in this one he creates a little go-kart complete with spikes, and a humorous anti 4 leaf clover sign (a nod to the previous film).  In Leprechaun 2 though it seems that 4 leaf clovers are no longer effective.  For this film the only thing that can hurt Leprechauns is wrought iron, of which there is lots and lots throughout the film.

The film takes place during St Patricks day, so there are many many people dressed as Leprechauns meaning the real one does not look out of place.  One bizarre scene in particular sees the Leprechaun at a Pub that is full of midgets dressed like him, as he takes place in a drinking competition the midgets all chant 'one of us! one of us!' perhaps as a homage to the classic 1930's horror film Freaks.  Again the film tries to inject humour into the proceedings, but the humour is more miss than hit.  At times the pacing of the film reminds me of Gremlins 2 with odd unrelated humour scenes occurring for no real reason (such as the Leprechaun going to a Coffee House to sober up).

Warwick Davis is again excellent as the villain.  The female he is after doesn't have a lot to do in the film, but she looks pretty, and isn't stereotypically useless.  Her boyfriend is terrible at acting angry or upset, almost embarrassing in some scenes where he is shouting curses, and meant to be really upset, heh.  The boys mentor Morty is fantastic and nearly steals the film, though later plot developments see him descend from his throne as highlight of the film.

I did enjoy this film, it is well worth watching, a good sequel.  Look forward to seeing the rest of them!  Though must warn that the Leprechauns hideout does look legitimately like it was made out of paper maiche!

SCORE:

Leprechaun - Horror Film Review

The Leprechaun box set was on sale for around £12, it contained the first 5 Leprechaun films (think there are 6 in total).  I picked it up as I have always wanted to see the films after the Leprechaun showed up on a DVD of the top horror film slashers.

Leprechaun is a slasher film.  It stars Warwick Davis (of Willow, and Star Wars fame) as an evil Leprechaun.  As a boring side note, I once saw Warwick Davis at a sci-fi convention, though I had no idea who he was at the time.  The film is a prequel to the Friends sit-com series and sees Jennifer Aniston's character going on vacation to red neck country with her father.  The house they are staying at was the scene of Leprechaun inspired craziness after a American Irishman arrived there after having captured a Leprechaun and forced it to give the man its gold coins.  Leprechauns in real life are evil demons.  This one followed the man back to his house, and then unleashed mayhem in a bid to get his gold back.  The Irishman managed to trap him in a crate where the Leprechaun was stuck for 10 years.  The Leprechaun sees anyone as a potential thief of his gold and has no qualms against killing anyone he sees as guilty.  Jennifer and a bunch of other teenagers come under siege from the mad wee fellow and must find a way to stop his reign of terror.

Warwick is cool as the Leprechaun.  The Leprechaun is able to teleport, as well as use magical powers.  Each of his 100 coins he gets back grants him more power.  He is able to perfectly imitate the voice of any Human or Animal, he can seemingly summon children's toys (such as a pogo stick, tricycle, and skate board) and is indestructible for the most part, able to get shot close range many times, limbs severed, and beaten with no permanent consequences.  He is kinda a idiot though.  He is obsessed with his gold, and is completely delusional that everyone in the world is after it, all he goes on about is punishing people for taking his gold.

The Human characters are ok, but there so likable that it is obvious that none of them are going to die.  The film has very few deaths, around 4 overall I think it was.  Mostly the Leprechaun attacks via his razor sharp teeth, and claws, and does like to wise crack, though not as much as Freddy Kruger.  He is not remotely a scary character, his green Leprechaun costume puts paid to that.

It was an entertaining film, though lack of ideas meant it did kinda outstay its welcome a bit with too much screen time for Warwick Davis running around shouting about his stolen coins.

SCORE:

Class 3 Outbreak (2010) - Zombie Videogame Review (PC)

Class 3 Outbreak is a web based free to play real time strategy game that takes place using Google Earth, and involves the outbreak of zombie apocalypse.

You control up to three squads of police who must fulfil various conditions while defending against zombies. There are two maps. One is set in Leicester, while the bigger of the two is set in Washington DC (UPDATE: there now appears to be a large variety of maps taking place at locations all around the world). The whole game area is created using Google Earth. The police, civilians, and zombies all react to the flat images of Google Earth; they walk around cars and house, and objects, and when they go by trees they become silhouettes.

The game starts with your (up to) three squads investigating the emergence of a zombie apocalypse.  After a set time has passed a newsflash is shown which features a news reporter updating viewers on the growing emergency. Your goal after this is to secure scientists who appear on the map as symbols. Locate these and they follow you. Next after the outbreak intensifies you have five minutes in which you must locate a pilot, and then escape to the helipad and escape the area before the army nuke the place.

I played the game on normal, it was very easy. The police automatically shoot any nearby zombies.  While you can specifically instruct them to shoot targets I found there was no need. Harder difficulties reduce the amount of police you get to control, as well as the usual making you weaker, and the zombies tougher.

All in all Class 3 Outbreak lasts from start to finish about ten minutes. It was a fun distraction, but limited due to just the two locations. It would have been amazing if they had done a level set in Northampton (where I live). It is clever how the characters react to the flat Google images, and a cool touch with cars being set up to look like they are blocking off roads and causing blockades.

SCORE:

Resident Evil T-Shirt

Because I am an almighty lazy monster here is my new T-Shirt I got today.

It was supposed to be black, but I was sent a rust coloured one instead.  It is too much hassle to return it, and it makes a change to have a colour other than black.  The T-Shirt is plain except for the Umbrella Symbol, and the words 'Umbrella Corporation'.  Of course the Umbrella Corporation are the company responsible for the creation of the T-Virus and other Virus's that turn people into zombies, and create monsters.  Was about £8 off E-bay, don't know how well it will wash.

The Grudge 3 - Horror Film Review

I knew The Grudge 3 was being made, but I didn't realise it was out until I saw it for cheap on Amazon. It is the American made Grudge 3, rather than the Japanese one (not even sure if Ju-On The Grudge 3 has been made).  I put off seeing it as I'm a bit Grudged out at the moment after experiencing the horrifying (ly bad) Nintendo Wii Grudge game.

The Grudge 3 starts off with the young surviving boy from Grudge 2 at a mental hospital.  It's not a spoiler to say that he is killed in the pre credits sequence.  The Grudge's curse is spreading as the remaining tenants at the Chicago apartment are getting killed off one by one.  The arrival of a mysterious Japanese woman signals a possible end to the madness as she reveals that she knows a way to stop the spread of evil.  But will she succeed or will the curse claim her life too?

The films plot is much more simplified this time.  Grudge 2 took place at various times, and with various characters.  This film centres around the care taker (Max) of the cursed apartment block, and his 2 sisters as they slowly become keyed in to the origins of the curse, and start to see the creepy woman and boy ghosts.  The younger of the two sisters is just a child, yet she fore goes the usual 'creepy child' syndrome and instead comes across as a sweet kid, even lending the ghost boy her Mr Potato Head early on in the film.  The older of the two sisters is the films main lead and is very likable (and beautiful) though also too human, all too ready to ignore the possibility of the curses existence.  Max's transition from caring guardian to crazed psychopath is well done, and very gradual.

There is a lot more deaths this time around.  It's some sort of rule for horror franchises that each film has to have more deaths than the one previous, this is no different.  Many of the deaths mostly occur off screen, with just the build up to the characters death shown, but these build ups are entertaining.  One character is plagued with pictures bleeding paint in the moments leading to her death, while another in a secure mental hospital is chased through heavily locked corridors by the ghost woman, most the deaths are cool.

The ghosts this time appear to be different actors.  The ghost boy in particular looks taller than before which was distracting.  They are visibly wearing caked on white make up which I did not notice before.  I don't know if it is supposed to be make up, or if its just bad ghost design.  The characters are a lot more likeable this time around, so you really do wish for their survival.

The film is a good entry in the series, though with the ghost woman/ghost boy part of the story finished I can't see how there could be a new film coming for the franchise.  A cool film, well worth a watch.  Lets face it, anything is better than the original Grudge!

SCORE:

Urban Legends: Bloody Mary - Horror Film Review

Urban Legends: Bloody Mary is the third film in the Urban Legend series.  This time the film is more supernatural, and again is unrelated for the most part to the previous 2 films.

Three girls having a sleepover accidentally summon an angry spirit of a girl killed when a high school prank went wrong in the 60's.  After a similar prank is played on the girls by some bullies the bullies start to be killed off one by one via methods relating to urban legends by an unknown assailant.  One of the girls, and her twin brother decide to investigate the origins of the Mary girl in a bid to not only stop any more people being killed, but to put Marys spirit to rest.

The film was nearly good.  It has original death scenes, and entertaining ones, yet the whole story is such a mess of unresolved plot threads, and giant plot holes that the film just collapses upon itself.  It is a fun film, just not good.  The plot holes are frustrating, and numerous.  Key characters go off screen never to be seen again, or mentioned, a characters ability to predict the urban legend deaths is never explained, and just why does an angry spirit go to the bother of killing people in the style of urban legends anyway?

The special effects are good, and at the same time terrible.  The deaths are all cool to see.  A man who urinates on an electric fence, a man who has his dog hung up in his wardrobe with words written in blood next to it saying 'people can lick too', and a girl who has a really disgusting death of hundreds of baby spiders burst out of a lump she finds on her face, who then falls over into a mirror, getting a shard of mirror jammed in her forehead, and then rips out the glass taking off half her face with it!  Unfortunately there is a reliance on CGI meaning the spider scene is muted somewhat by the spiders being blatantly computer generated (still turned my stomach mind!)

The main female lead for some reason has a psychic connection to the ghost which leads to some jump moments, or least that's what it tries to lead to. The film never really decides if it wants the deaths to have been caused by Mary, or by the human slasher that is also doing the rounds.

There are some clever nods to the previous films, well to Urban Legend 2 anyway.  Doing research the main character discovers a newspaper report about the professor from Urban Legends, and a man watching porn in a motel is actually watching cleverly edited scenes of a love scene from Urban Legends 2!

The film was straight to DVD, but does look quite slick.  I did enjoy the film, just that the plot is nonsensical, and some of the acting is highly suspect.

SCORE:

Doom II (1994) - Horror Video Game Review (XBox 360)

Doom II is out on literally everything, recently it was released on Xbox 360 Live Arcade for 800 Microsoft Points. I of course brought it, so now own the game at least three times (also have it on PC, and I think I have it twice on the original Xbox). This latest version has a new chapter, called No Rest For the Living that comprises nine levels.

Everyone knows Doom has a super cool story...heh. The stories in Doom occur after each chapter. It is a screen of humorous text describing the goings on. Anyway Doom II takes place directly after the first game. Having stopped the invasion of Hell to the bases of Mars, our hero returns to Earth. There he discovers that Earth is also being invaded by the legions of Hell. The marine must get to a Hell portal, then travel once again to the heart of Hell to destroy the evil.

The game of course is a first person shooter. Quite basic in that you are unable to look up or down, or strafe. Also your weapons do not require reloading. The enemies are all flat pixelated ones, but the game has a lovely charm to it.

Up to the end of the first chapter the enemies are all exactly the same as from Doom. But a wonderful curve ball is thrown when for the rest of the game a whole host of new enemies are introduced. These include the 'Pain Elemental' that spits out 'Lost Souls' (flying flaming skulls), a skeleton with shoulder mounted rocket launchers, giant cyborg spiders, as well as a load of other horrors. All the original games enemies are also present, which of course include the zombie soldiers, cacodemons, and iconic imps.

The game has thirty levels which gradually get more hellish looking. Starting off at the space port, later levels move onto residential areas, then into Hell where there is lots of lava, walls dripping green slime, and teleporters. The later of these levels are utterly crazy with amazing numbers of enemies pitched at you! One in particular sees you descend on a lift into a literal sea of imps! One minor complaint with all these enemies is that it can be hard to see the un killed ones through the masses of dead, that's a cool annoyance, but still bothered me on occasion.

The music is amazing of course. Comprised of cool midi action horror tunes. Doom tunes always remind me of Metallica minus the singing. The game has not been updated to be HD or anything, but it doesn't need to be, it is still a wonderful game despite its age. I hope that Quake one day appears on Xbox Live Arcade (not Quake II though as that's an extra on the underrated Quake IV).

SCORE:

Wishmaster - A horror film review

Wishmaster is a film by Wes Craven.  It has all the hallmarks of a 80's slasher film in the vein of Lepracaun or Nightmare on Elm Street et al, yet I was surprised to find the film was released as late as 1997! There are lots of cameos from famous horror actors including such ones as Ted Raimi, Kane Hodder, and Robert Englund.

The film starts in ancient times, a evil Djinn (a race of Demons that live in the veil between worlds) is causing havoc at a sultans palace.  Djinns grant wishes, they can only act if it is via a wish.  Unlike the Djinns of pop culture (Djinns are also known as Genies) the Djinns hate humans and purposly twist the wishers wish into a grotesque parody of itself.  Anyway the Palace Wizard manages to trap the Djinn in a enchanted gem.  1000 years later and a ancient statue is acidently destroyed, encased in the centre of the statue was the gem which a attractive woman; Alexandra accidently frees the Djinn from after rubbing the gem.  For the Djinns race to escape thier prison of being between worlds the releaser must use thier three wishes, so the Djinn starts a wave of terror designed to scare Alexandra into using her three wishes so that his people can enslave the world.

The film is really enjoyable in a trashy kind of way, and screams 80's horror.  Lots of cool effects are used.  Particulary pemorable is the first 5 minutes in which a man walks through a party where the guests are all being murdered.  Insects and monsters are bursting out of people, one man has his skin all fall off him, while another has been turned into a human snake creature; very entertaining.

The Djinn is not that original a look, but he is able to shape shift.  He has a similer type of black humour that Freddy Kruger has, but he isn't as overt as Freddy.  The Djinn is only able to kill if someone makes a wish.  Usually he can turn there wish into a reason to kill.  For instance a girl wishes she could stay beautiful forever, the Djinn turns her into a mannequin.  All his kills are based around these cool twists, and are very entertaining.  For each wish the Djinn grants he gets stronger, able to feed off the souls of the wish makers.

The whole plot to the film really is not original at all, but as a homage to 80's horror it is excellant.  It doesn't try to be anything other than shoclky fun.  There are 3 sequals to this film, each time with different characters, will probably hunt them down.

General update for June 2010

Hey there. Just got back from a whistle stop tour of Hell. Blasted my way through it and out again. My new site I am still waiting for, my web designer is taking his sweet time! If I was actually paying him for his work I might have something to legitimately complain about, as it is, it's hard to moan at someone who is doing you a huge favour!

Lots of games I am playing at the moment, but none I want to review  before I complete them. These include Doom II on X-Box Live Arcade, Viking: Battle for Asgard, Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes (the Nintendo DS one), and the truly terrible Ju-On: The Grudge on the Nintendo Wii. Ghoul Patrol; the sequel to Zombies Ate my Neighbours was released on the Virtual Console last Friday, so I got that.

On the film front; I have a growing pile of DVDs waiting to be watched, and several literal mountains of VHS cassettes, though they are not all horrors. Book wise I am steadily building up a collection of James Herbert horrors, as well as Dean Koontz. I just have no darn time to fit reading into my life!

I played Wet recently. While not a horror game, it is an action game influenced heavily by seventies grind house. You play as an assassin (voiced by the beautiful girl whose name I forget; she played Faith in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer series) armed with duel pistols, and a katana which you use to violent effect. The main bad guy is voiced by the brilliant Malcolm McDowell.

Lastly I am doing a scientific experiment. I have a shot glass 1/3 full of blood and am monitoring it daily to see what it does. So far it has turned into a jelly type substance, exciting times!

Bright Falls (2010) - Webisode Horror Series Review

Bright Falls is a six part webisode series that is a live action prequel to the X-Box 360 and PC game Alan Wake.  Each of the six webisodes is about five minutes in length.

A reporter heads to the remote town of Bright Falls to interview a man there for an article he has been commissioned to write. While there he starts to increasingly have blackouts and is unable to remember anything that happened while blacked out. Several times he wakes up in the woods, coated in some clay type substance. Realising that something strange is going on with him, and that he is for some reason unable to leave the town of Bright Falls he enlists his ex-girlfriend to help get him out of the town.

Despite only being thirty minutes long in total there is quite a lot jammed into this small series. Bright Falls has obviously been influenced by the amazing David Lynch TV show Twin Peaks. Everything from the setting of a remote town, to the mellow music brings memories of that show, as does the townspeople who all appear to be eccentric and odd much like Twin Peaks characters. The reporter spends a lot of his time at the local diner; again another nod to Twin Peaks.

I have not played Alan Wake, nor seen much about it, but there is some foreshadowing of the game I think. The reporter keeps discovering that he has written a load of stuff that he has no memory of writing. In Alan Wake I think the whole scope of the game is Alan finding pages from a novel he has no memories of writing.

Many of the townsfolk have gone slightly psychotic, in particular destroying lights, and having a painful reaction to light. Again this is key to Alan Wake in which he must first stun enemies with lights before he is able to dispatch them.

The webisode series ends with Alan Wake and his wife driving into town and discovering a car crash.  I really hope that this is the way the actual game starts, that would be cool. I really want to play Alan Wake, when it is cheaper I shall do so. The webisode series is of a high quality, and well worth watching for free either on the internet, or downloaded from the game videos section on the X-Box 360 dashboard.

SCORE:

Alien Breed Evolution: Episode 1 (2009-10) - Video Game Review (X-Box 360)

When I was a teen I briefly owned an Amiga, the games I had on that included Alien Breed 1, and 2.  These were overhead adventure games in which you were a soldier working your way through a base fighting what looked suspiciously like the creatures from the Alien. Each floor of the base was made up of lots of rooms and corridors that you had to work your way through. I remember it being really hard as the enemies were very numerous.

Alien Breed Evolution on X-Box Live Arcade is a remake, or rather a rebirth for the series. The ship you are a passenger on; The Leopald (I think) comes out of hyperspace only to crash into a gigantic derelict space hulk that hadn't shown on the scanners. Your ship is firmly wedged in the side of the hulk. To make matters worse it seems the hulk was home to millions of insectoid aliens. Now they have invaded the Leopald and are killing everyone in sight. To make matters e-v-e-n more worse both your ship, and the space hulk are on a collision course with a nearby planet. As veteran soldier Conrad you must follow the instructions of a robot to restore stability to the ship, and to extradite the ship from the hulk.

The game is an isometric 3D action adventure game. Each level is set on a different floor of the ship and involves you doing a shed load of menial tasks to restore power and systems to the rapidly collapsing ship, while fighting off hordes of aliens that burrow out of the ground and climb out of the walls. The game was made using the Unreal Engine, so it looks really good, again proving how versatile the Unreal Engine is. Lighting and shadows are fantastic, the explosions, electricity, and objects really bring a sense of reality to the ship, it feels like your on a real spacecraft (one with absolutely no toilets nonetheless)

There are quite a lot of aliens, but to be honest they all look pretty much identical. As well as facehugger type critters (complete with pods they crawl out of) there are human size enemies that mostly attack by charging you. You have an Aliens style scanner in the top right of the screen, you will spend a heck of a lot of time keeping one beady eye on this for the tell tale red bleep that indicates a incoming enemy. Instead of all their bizarre real time strategy, and first person shooters the holders of the Aliens licence should really make a game in this style, as this is one of the most Alien like games I have ever played.

You have access to quite a few weapons. As well as an infinite ammo pistol you also get a machine gun, rifle, shotgun, laser gun, and more. Frag grenades and stun grenades show up in your secondary items, as do sentry guns, and first aid kits. The aliens die in satisfying piles of goo.

The story is pretty weak during levels, though is some entertaining comic book style exposition during levels. There are logs hidden through the game, but rather than have story these disappointingly just provide information on the various enemy types. There are non player characters that appear in levels, but for the most part these are there only so that you can see them killed in various ways by the aliens with no chance to save them.

The game is two player, but as usual I don't have any friends to play this mode with. I can guess it would probably be quite fun in two player (update: I once tried this in two player but my friend had no idea what he was doing which led to frustration). The game can get a bit samey, only the last level really has a different look, and you spend most the game taking out the enemies in the exact same fashion.

Alien Breed Evolution was real fun though, it is just the first part of a trilogy so ends on a cliff-hanger with the story not complete. The game took around 5 hours to do, so for 800 Microsoft points it isn't bad (if it was 800, I can't recall). Sci-fi horror done well then, I look forward to episode 2.

SCORE:

[REC] 2 - Zombie Film Review

Rec 2 is the sequel to the cult classic; the Spanish horror film Rec.  The film takes place literally straight after the end of the first film.  Again it uses the Blair Witch style of 'found footage' to bring you right into the action.

After a brief sequence showing the end of the first film the action goes to a SWAT van were a small SWAT team are on their way to the doomed building.  Once there they are tasked with protecting a Government Agent who needs to enter the building and assess the situation.  However once inside things quickly go South (my new fave phrase) which is to be expected with a place full of psychotic plague victims (zombies).  While this is all happening a group of dumb teens (also with camera) think it will be hilarious to sneak into the apartment building to see whats going on. 

The film is more fragmented than last time.  Each SWAT member has their own helmet mounted camera.  Their story goes on for perhaps a third of the film, then the film goes back to the start, this time showing events from the pesky teens perspective.  It's cool how it does this as sounds heard in the distance are now shown, so is clever how this was integrated.  Later yet another camera makes an appearance. WARNING; after the picture there will be spoilers, so if you have any interest in seeing this film then STOP READING!

This film is still horror, but is no longer a zombie film! In a cool early twist it is revealed that rather than plague victims the virus being spread is actually Demonic possession!  The Government Agent reveals himself to be a Priest, and lots of Exorcist style praying, and possessions go on, making the film like a Blair Witch style Exorcist rather than a 28 Days Later style zombie flick.  The zombies are able to be stopped by exorcism rites.  This was a development I really hadn't expected.  While it was a bit disappointing to see the Zombies relegated to Demons this was well handled with the SWAT team at first thinking the Priest is mad, but coming to the realisation that what he is saying is real.

I had expected the film to be boring as it was set in the same location as the first, but it really wasn't.  There are lots and lots of references to Rec which was to be expected, but lots of zombies are still banging around from that, and some of the more bizarre later stuff is explained.  The fate of the reporter is also revealed, was cool to see her again!  The film is more violent, with obviously a much higher budget, and has some scenes that seem directly lifted from Quarantine (such as snipers shooting at survivors who go near the windows).

The film is the length of a normal film this time around, being near an hour and a half.  The film also has a much bigger dark humorous streak to it.  The fat zombie woman from Rec is still charging around, and the film seems to have a cheeky nod to how unkillable she was by again getting her repeatedly beaten only for her to comically reappear later on (while the other zombies for the most part die normally)  The teens have a lot of dark humour surrounding them also (such as a boy who finds a pistol, and then keeps accidentally firing it off every now and again).

The characters are cool, but never as likable as the lot in the first film.  The SWAT team are pretty faceless, though the way they react to the events that happen are believable.  The Priest on the other hand is annoying,  mostly for the fact that the SWAT team can only be evacuated by his signal, so he pretty much blackmails them into helping him complete his stupid mission.  The teens are really stupid and annoying, but it is pleasureable to see them collapse in panic as it is totally their fault they are in the situation.Unlike every other character who entered the building for noble reasons, or unknowingly, the teens purposely entered a building sealed off by the military as they somehow thought it would be funny to do so.

The film leaves a cliff hanger that totally sets up a sequel, though whether this actually happens or not who knows?  Well worth watching if you were a fan of the original.  Not as good, but then sequels generally aren't

SCORE:

[REC] - Zombie Film Review

Rec is the film that the American made Quarantine was based on.  The film was made in Spain, and so is in Spanish with English subtitles.

The plot, and what happens is identical to Quarantine, so for more details look at that review.  Basically a reporter and her cameraman enter a apartment building on the trail of a Fire crew they are following.  Some sort of highly contagious virus is loose in the building, and as a result the building is sealed off by the military.

The whole film is shot Blair Witch style from the perspective of the cameraman.  The film is only 74 minutes long, so runs at a far quicker pace than the sometimes stretched out Quarantine.  Many times the camera cuts out and comes back at a different point, as such it does not feel as much real time as Quarantine which never cut out at all (as far as I can remember).  The effects are obviously not as good, being a film with a much smaller budget, but they are effective regardless.  The zombies (well, infected people) look great, especially the zombie child.

Quarantine is the more exciting film to watch due to quite a lot of stuff added.  There are no lifts full of dogs, or crazed rats in this film, or death via camera, but the films shortness really ramps up the horror.  It was interesting that the cause of the virus was different in this film which was cool.  The acting seemed good (hard to tell being in Spanish) and the main character of the reporter was again very effectively played.

I plan to go to Milton Keynes tomorrow to watch Rec 2 that has just come out.  Apparently that film starts 5 minutes after the end of this one.  No doubt the fate of the apartment dwellers will be revealed.  Cannot wait! (provided I can afford to drive to MK)

SCORE: