A television news reporter and her cameraman are trapped inside a building with its residents after the CDC quarantines the building. A raging virus, supposedly a super strain of rabies is turning everyone into murderous monsters.
Before I start tearing this film apart, on a base level I kinda liked it. It had flaws, quite a few that made me only kinda like it. The movie had a lot more potential, and I do need to see the original Spanish film “REC” now. The lead actress screams an awful lot, and it does get annoying, but it also fits in with the story. As things intensify she becomes more and more irrational and just plain freaked out.
Now for the problems. This virus makes people into indiscrimate killers, yet they only seem to attack non-infected people. That didn’t make any sense to me. A rabid animal will attack anything, even another rabid animal. Yet somehow when this super strain affects people they can still pick and choose who they attack. Also, the progression of the virus. The first people infected seem to take much longer to react to the virus, and later in the film it seems to only take minutes for the virus’ affects to be seen. Apparently rabies also makes you super strong, which would explain the rabid granny that could overpower a cop and firefighter.
Then there is the camerman. The whole film is seen through his lens, and I have to say, for a professional camerman he sucks. The camera is always swinging around, always losing focus. I can understand that later in the film when he is running, but this happens even in the beginning when he is standing still. I am also getting a little tired of these everything seen through a camera type of movies. This one at least made more sense than some others because it was a tv crew filming things to document them, but still, I think eventually someone would have smashed the damn camera.
I also cannot understand the idea that the CDC would send in just two guys to take some samples and no type of protection. It is another of the stupid moves done just to progress the movie. Oh, and lets have a couple that doesn’t speak English and point it out several times, but in the end they will be completely background fixtures that have nothing to do with the story other than eventually becoming victims of the virus.
Boy, the more I think about this movie the more I am finding reasons to dislike it. Better stop before I go home and destroy the disc. Could have been so much better than it was, but as far as modern horror made in the US goes, it wasn’t awful, 2 Axes.