REC Review

It's nearly October and that can only mean 2 things.
1. It's getting dark and blowy at night so there's no distractions from writing bum about films.
2. Halloween, horror films are great to write about until I've made myself feel ill and desentisized by the brutality. Until then friends bravely onwards...

REC (2007)
REC is a Spanish horror film by directors Jaume Balaguero and Luis Berdejo, a kind of mix of Diary of the Dead and Blair Witch Project. The conceit is that a reporter and her cameraman are filming a firestation and the men that work at it in Barcelona so when the call goes out to attend to a situation in an appartment bloke they tag along.

Once there events rapidly spiral out of control as both firemen and residents are infected with a virus that turns them into pseudo zombies, events aren't helped when the building is sealed off to stop the virus spreading further. The survivors have to decide to hide or find an escape route while their numbers are being reduced.

In a first person film like this you won't get beautiful lighting or gliding cameras, it's all rollercoaster, throw you from one end of the story to the other with a couple of breathers to build a little character and provide exposition. This helps cover up for a lack of budget and while you have to accept that someone would carry on filming while running for their life from people who want to rip you limb from limb it does make the jumps more effective.

The final few moments provide a cause for the virus and that's where the real surprise of the film comes in, it gives you a religious explanation that you just wouldn't get from an American film. After the initial few moments you take to process this it makes for an interesting change from the usual radioactive goop.

As a zombie film and as an exploration of the single camera set up this is a lot more successful than Romero's Diary of the Dead as the acting is of a much better standard and there's no heavy handed voice over to carefully explain to the slower members of the audience what's going on.

All in all a nice solid horror film.