Quarantine is a zombie flavored shaky cam horror film that apparently exists in a world where no one has ever seen a zombie film. Now I understand that your first conclusion when put into a situation such as this, is to not assume “Oh shit, they’re zombies!” but given a certain number of highly obvious signs, wouldn’t it be safe to treat the situation as such?

I don’t do this often but I highly recommend you all pick up The Zombie Survival Guide. While it isn’t required reading, it basically does a better job than I probably ever could about railing on the stupidity inherent with zombie movies.

But honestly, you don’t even have to be a zombie expert to survive these kinds of situations.   Just do what makes sense.

Old Zombies - Dentures = Worst Hickey Ever!

(Seriously though a grandma with rabies should have just as much biting capacity as a grandma without.  Considering as how mine can’t break the skin of a ripe tomato with her choppers, I’d say the blood gushing effects of these rabies grannies are a bit far reaching. 

So carrying a camera that has infrared on it is a semi smart choice for a situation where you are in a pitch black environment surrounded by monsters, but you know what might have made a better option?  An actual weapon.  Honestly wouldn’t that be the first thing you do?  Find any large blunt or sharp object to ward off things that want to bite you?  With the exception of the firefighter with the axe, and the first scene with the cop, I can’t think of a single fucking person who picked up a weapon.  That bludgeoning a zombie with a camera scene was ridiculous.   I don’t know what kind of camera they use for news production, but unless it’s got a blunt steel edge with high impact resistance surrounding the camera lens, I imagine it wouldn’t be your go to weapon.  Do they make camera bayonets? Probably not because it would be really stupid.

But the functionality of the camera came into play only at the end of the movie.  There was still a good hour and a half, where it was carried around and completely fucking useless.   It brings up another point of concern. What was up with police cutting the power?  What benefit does that achieve when you’ve already cut off phone, Internet, and cell phone access.   Are you that worried that the people trapped inside a building with zombies getting, and who are getting  sniped when they try to leave, will find out that you’re quarantining them by using a TV with rabbit ears? I’m pretty sure when the last tenant who tried to escape got shot through the face by a police sniper, that the jig was up.  Oh and why would he even have to adjust the antennae on his tv to get a barely audible news feed.  Does he regularly watch this TV, or does he only reserve it for zombie invasions.

But even with the lights out, and the vast advantage you have by being able to see an enemy without them seeing you, no effort was taken to attack.  I understand that fighting for your life is not the most natural thing to all people, but it should be for at least a few more than was shown in this movie.

The movie also rewards stupidity and punishes the intelligent.  Drunk or not, the tenant that wanted to return to his room and board it up made the most sense.  But in order to dissuade the viewer from asking that question, the writer created a tool to punish his intelligent decision by having a random dog kill him.  But why would anyone want a defensible position, where you don’t have to worry about an attack from unknown directions.  Your best bet is to mull around in a room filled with the sick, dying, and the diseased.    Oh and please don’t think about picking up the dead cops gun and ammunition, because that would have absolutely no use in a situation like this.

At one point they discover that a little girl has become rabid.  Rather than just killing the evil little thing, the only remaining cop decides she needs a hug.  

This was a smart move and worked out really well for him.

nam nam nam D.A.R.E nam nam nam

The only creatures that weren’t stupid in this movie were the zombies themselves.  They worked well as a team.  Coordinated, and resourceful.  They won’t let that thin glass door prevent them from the fruits of their, crazy biting people’s faces off desires.  The disease is pretty smart too.  Rather than being just bat shit insane, it makes people bat shit insane with a purpose.  The disease made its infected not only injure people rather than kill allowing for proliferation, but also to not have infected creatures attack each other.  I thought if you get rabies you attack everything, but apparently super terrorist rabies makes you only attack …non-rabid (sounds too kosher to be correct) individuals.

While I try to post only empirical evidence of stupidity, and try to keep opinion out of things as much as possible (not really though), I’d like to send out a big “Fuck You.” to the guy who thought it was a great idea to not only have the last fucking scene of the movie be showcased in its trailer, but also be used as the cover for the movie image itself.   What a smart fucking move that was.

Thanks a lot, dick.

5 Comments »

1. I enjoyed this movie, I like it enough that I just purchased it… That being said, I agree with every last thing you wrote here. I feel a little refreshed knowing I am not the only one marveling at the ignorance of people unwilling to defend themselves or even arm themselves, a cop trying to hug a child that just bit her own mothers face half off, or the fact that rabid things attack everything, even being delusional enough to attack inanimate objects around them. In this movie work in teams perfectly, never fighting one another. Whatever, entertainment is entertainment, I gave up on hollywood producing anything that isnt just stupid flashy entertainment about the time I learned to dress myself.

   Comment by Dyybuk — June 1, 2009 @ 7:05 pm

2. I agree with Dyybuk, that entertainment is entertainment, etc… But it is also entertaining to talk about and read the silliness of these movies.

   Comment by Human — October 19, 2009 @ 6:22 pm

3. I saw quarantine for the first time last night and wanted to check online to see if anyone else realized the idiocy in the movie. You sit there wondering why the hell isn’t someone getting the gun of the other officer. Why did they just leave the grandma who just bit the officer in the neck by yourself to kill someone else upstairs and the film crew had to be the one who saw that. Then the camera guy. I mean wtf. Also if it’s rabies they attack each other. Yes it was interesting to watch, but afterwards you wonder why the hell did these people not pick up weapons. You would think they hadn’t seen a zombie flick themselves.. LOL Thanks for the writeup.

   Comment by Dawgsrulz — December 26, 2009 @ 9:01 am

4. Saw the original spanish movie, REC, first and decided to see this one as well, just to see how Hollywood would fuck it up. They didn’t disappoint me in the least. While REC had many (or possibly all) of the problems you listed here, it was also scary as shit. It didn’t have the american female lead. You know, the howling, hysterical disaster waiting to happen. The first thing on my agenda after finding somewhere safe to hole up, would be to brain that twat with something, just to shut her up.

   Comment by El Pollo Diablo — March 26, 2010 @ 12:11 pm

5. Glad you guys all like the review! The problem with zombie movies these days, are that they’re trying to legitimize them scientifically. It always ends up being a thin superficial layer of psuedo science that doesn’t fails to corraborate it’s own symptoms. It was much better back when the cause was left open ended, and they focused more on the struggle.

   Comment by Bebarce — April 5, 2010 @ 5:19 am

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