DVD review (region 1)
Directed by John Erick Dowdle
Starring Jennifer Carpenter, Steve Harris, Jay Hernandez, Johnathon Schaech
Release date 17 February 2009

A TV presenter (Carpenter) and cameraman (Harris) accompany a fire crew to a disturbance at an apartment block. But once there they find themselves trapped in the building in the midst of a zombie outbreak…

Watching Quarantine is an eerie experience, and not just because of its throat-ripping gore. This is no loose remake of Spanish shaky-cam hit [Rec] but (give or take an extra squashed rat) virtually exactly the same movie – in terms of dialogue, shots and location. It feels more like a franchise restaurant than a movie.

Of course, not everyone has seen Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza's horror hit, and if you haven’t had a chance to catch it then you’re likely to find Quarantine scores on the scares front. It’s tightly plotted and edited, unravels at just the right pace and contains several cool shock moments… But there’s no getting away from the fact it’s just not quite as good as [Rec]. Dexter’s Jennifer Carpenter, though serviceable enough, makes for a slightly more hysterical and irritating reporter than the lovely Manuela Velasco, and the finale is a fraction less effective here. But if this isn’t a film with any ideas or worth of its own, at least its makers haven’t obliterated the tension of the original entirely.

The standard set of extras (‘making of’, a feature on the effects, a upbeat commentary from John Dowdle and his co-writer brother John Dowdle) barely acknowledge the existence of [Rec] at all. Matt McAllister

VERDICT: 6/10
If you’ve seen [Rec] then Quarantine is a slightly pointless experience (other than as an extended game of spot the difference). But anyone who can’t be bothered with the Spanish language original should find this a tightly made shocker.