Quarantine

Mere months have passed since REC shuddered onto our screens, but already the only marginally inferior American remake is upon us.
In this frequently facsimiled version, the wonderful Jennifer Carpenter (Dexter) leads the screams as a late night reality TV host whose fly-on-the-wall visit to a fire station takes her into a quarantined apartment block. There, she and other trapped inhabitants turn against each another as the pressure of getting stuck with contagious zombie-vampires begins to tell.
The mockumentary framing recalls Cloverfield and Diary Of The Dead and newcomer Dowdle proves capable of making an audience jump out of their seats. Nonetheless, Quarantine, a decent, chilling enough entertainment as these things go, is always at its frightful best when it’s aping the original.
Deviations from the Spanish source, though few in number, prove ill-advised. Did we really need to turn all the lights out thus reducing much of the action to a sub-Blair Witch blur? And why soften the devastation by playing up the victims’ nastier attributes?
The decision to tack on unnecessary explanations for the outbreak is equally irritating. Ravaging undead hordes. That’s all we need to know.