Directors: Jaume Belagueró and Paco Plaza
Screenplay: Jaume Belagueró, Luis A. Berdejo and Paco Plaza
Starring: Manuela Velasco, Pablo Rosso, Ferrán Terraza, Jorge-Yaman Serrano
One-sentence summary: A reporter and her cameraman end up quarantined in an apartment building where a deadly infection similar to rabies has begun to spread.
Directors: Jaume Belagueró and Paco Plaza
Screenplay: Jaume Belagueró, Manu Díaz and Paco Plaza
Starring: Jonathan Mellor, Pablo Rosso, Óscar Sanchez Zafra, Ariel Casas, Alejandro Casaseca, Àlex Batllori, Pau Poch, Andrea Ros, Manuela Velasco
One-sentence summary: An official from the Ministry of Health is escorted into the quarantined apartment building to retrieve a blood sample from the Medeiros girl, but the situation soon becomes more complex than anyone had imagined.
Review: It's difficult to reinvent zombies, particularly when you consider that what now passes for the "modern zombie" was started by George A. Romero through his use of zombies as social commentary. When you think about zombies like that, they become pretty boring. The whole rising-from-the-dead and flesh-eating bits are common staples, and more often than not we see some sort of virus as an explanation for the creation of zombies. When you see a zombie movie, you usually know what you're going to get.
[REC] and [REC]² are not your typical zombie movies.
Adopting the cinéma vérité style and applying it to a horror film about zombies wasn't quite that original when [REC] came along (Romero's Diary of the Dead predates [REC] by about a year or so) but that doesn't diminish the experience of watching [REC]. The acting doesn't feel like acting, due in part to Belagueró and Plaza not being completely up-front with the actors about what was going on the day of the shoot. It's loose and reactionary, and that was the key element in making [REC] stand out. It feels authentic.
Boy, does it feel authentic.
I've said before how I hate jump scares. They're cheap if not done well. [REC] and [REC]² don't have any sort of score to speak of, and that makes the jump scares genuinely thrilling. You don't have crescendoing violins letting you know when you should be scared; it's exactly like what would happen in real life if someone creeped up on you. [REC] is likely the only film I've seen where I actually screamed. You're on edge for most of the films because there's no score to let you know when to be scared, and you're never quite sure what might be around the corner when the camera turns. It's brilliant.
[REC] only hints at what might be the cause of the viral outbreak. [REC]² explores it more, and to be honest, it's probably the only reason why [REC]² exists. I won't spoil it because it's pretty original, in my opinion, and leads to a fantastic final act in [REC]² that had me genuinely excited for what Belagueró and Plaza have in store for [REC]³ Genesis and [REC]⁴ Apocalypse. (And hopefully we can avoid stupid characters like the teenagers in [REC]². If there were any stereotypical horror film archetypes in either movie, it would be those kids.)
I'd like to mention one last thing: the zombies in [REC]²? They're the infected cast members from the first movie. If that's not an example of treating the audience like they're smart, I don't know what is. Bravo, directors. Bravo.
Final word: [REC] is a genuinely brilliant horror film sure to give you plenty of scares. [REC]² is a little less off-the-cuff and a little less unique than its predecessor, but it opens up the "mythology" very well and has a damn awesome final act.
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