Shawn's Quarantine Review

2008 Movie #122 - Quarantine

I have REC downloaded but have never watched it, therefore I got to watch this version with no preconceptions. It's been a good year for R rated horror for the most part so it's nice to see Quarantine continue with that tradition. It's also nice to see it continues the trend of most 2008 R rated horror movies being pretty damn decent.

The movie will of course be compared to Cloverfield since it has the same style and feel going for it. There's even a night vision sequence, which as with all night vision sequences, is quite creepy. Horror movies have definitely turned me off night visioning. Next time my friends come over with their night vision googles and propose a night of green vision shenanigans, I'm sadly going to have to refuse.

Anyway of course the movie is nowhere near as good as Cloverfield (I still regard that as one of the finest movies this year, and it was one of the first ones too), but it's still entertaining and better than I expected. I did find the explanation for why they were still filming a little more plausable in this one than in Cloverfield, so that's one point in favour of Quarantine.

The acting is fine. Lead actress Dexter's Sister/Emily Rose has caught some shit for her performance but I gotta tell you, I'm pretty fucking certain that's how anyone would be acting in this same situation. Same with Dakota Fanning in War of the Worlds. That's how a fucking person acts when shit like that happens! I should know because I've been involved in both an alien invasion and a contaminated zombie building, so fuck you. Everyone else does fine really. The acting never takes you out of the movie, and sometimes when it comes to horror, that's pretty much all you can ask for.

The gore level is sufficient, although once again coming off Saw V it seems almost tame. There are a couple of pretty gross moments though so the gorehounds will still be kept happy with this one. It earns the R rating.

My biggest complaint though, especially as someone taking Advertising in school, is the promotion of this movie. The posters and the trailer all contain that one iconic shot (you know the one), so the whole movie you know the outcome of any event because well, you haven't seen that part yet. It's just a terrible marketing ploy and I have no idea what the hell they were thinking. It ruins a lot of the suspense and takes away any sort of power the ending of the movie might have had. Hopefully the marketing guy behind that one is forced to watch the original Beverly Hills Chihuahua trailer until his eyes bleed. That's the only example of worse marketing that I can think of. Terrible.

Overall though, it ain't great but it's pretty damn good. It's an eventual blu-ray purchase, which is starting to become the highest praise I can bestow upon a movie.

*** 1/2 / 5