A
television reporter named Angela Vidal (Jennifer
Carpenter) decides to do a fun documentary
project with her camera man and goes to a Los
Angeles fire station lead by the marshall named
Scott Percival (Steve Harris) in which they
travel to an apartment complex that was sealed
off by the government and the residents were
never seen again without any witnesses or
evidence.
They think this might be a great opportunity to
unravel this unsolved mystery as they are
assigned to this nightshift after a 911 call and
receive some blood curdling screams from one of
the buildings by a resident named Mrs. Espinoza
(Jeannie Epper) who has been infected by some
sort of an unknown disease that makes her attack
and try to kill.
After
a few of the residents are viciously attacked,
they try to escape with the news crew in tow,
only to find that the CDC has quarantined the
building with their phones, internet, televisions
and cell phones cut off and officials are not
relaying information to those locked inside.
The quarantine gets lifted and Angela shows
evidence on her camera when she tries to struggle
from this madness as even the fire marshall's are
getting this disease and killing one another.
A rip off on all those horror
mocumentaries like Blair Witch Project,
Cloverfield and Diary of the
Dead trying to use the same chemistry
but it looks very amateurish, difficult to watch
with the camera always jiggling as well as
filming in the dark and annoying helicopter
sounds which often drowns out the dialogues.
It was widely advertised during it's theatrical
run and had mixed reviews but once you watch this
film it is easily forgettable.
It does start off as a bad comedy almost and when
you expect for the best it almost starts off
right but then turns into a total disaster.
The acting is in fair shape as Jennifer
Carpenter brings out as much as she can with
her character trying to act witty at first but
that looked a little phony. However, she does
great on her intesnity and screaming with nice
fearful expressions too.
Steve Harris is not too bad as her sidekick
fire marshall showing good aggressive attitude to
his part when the terrors are about to happen.
Johnathon
Schaech seems fairly impressive after
getting the rabies looking like a dangerous
looking zombie.
Child actress Joey King has a small role
in this film as a child with rabies but deserves
to be mentioned in this turkey in which she
reacts well behaving normal and then going into a
terrifying rage.
A rat is stomped on
Some bitten legs and other parts on various
people
John
Erick Dowdle really fails with his work on
this film and tries to borrow heavily from the
same direction on Blair Witch Project by
trying to make the scene's effective but they are
tiring and hard to see.
He tries to start the film off by making it funny
with Jennifer Carpenter as the host of
her mocumentary trying to get it right without
traffic sounds before entering a firestation but
it looks very flat.
There was an interesting look at her going into a
locker room at the work station with Steve
Harris showing her around and the others
goofing off.
There was a good impression at first with her and
the other cast members playing firemen going to a
room in a building and trying to talk to someone
along with a nice reaction on bit part actress Jeannie
Epper acting insane and losing it by having
rabies but the shots on her attack scene's bit
the big one as it's hard to know what's going on.
There's a good reaction on supporting actor
Johnathon Schaech reacting like a zombie
being diagnosed with rabies.
We have a fairly good dialogue between Carpenter
and supporting child actress Joey King being
interviewed which looked more natural than the
other directions in this movie and probably the
best direction of all.
There's a good shot on King attacking
reacting to her rabies with the camera slamming
into her face to knock her out.
There's another good shot on her attacking but
again afterwards the camera jiggles too much and
the scene looks very dark afterwards.
We spot a good shot on a supporting actor
injecting a needle in Schaech's head with a great
disturbing reaction on Carpenter which
leaves an impression.
There are many shots on people running around in
the building but the camera is not well focused
and it looks dark as usual.
We have a last scene with Carpenter
alone with a green light shining on her which is
the worst direction of all cause you don't see
what is going on or why this is happening but she
does well acting hysterical.
No
music folks just annoying helicopter sounds.
|
