REC 2 - Movie Review

[philosoraptor42]

Below you will find my review for REC 2, the sequel to the Spanish handheld camera zombie movie REC.

I always try to avoid spoilers in all my reviews, however when it comes to sequels I think it's somewhat fair to presume that you've seen the original. As such, if you choose to "read more" you really ought to have seen REC already. If you haven't seen REC then beg, borrow or steal a copy and check it out. You really won't regret it and, as you might expect, the original is better than the sequel. To find out how much better though (for those who've seen the original already), you'll need to read on...


REC 2 (2009)

REC 2 follows directly on from the events in REC. So you'll remember that when we finished last time around we were in the dark, watching through night vision, while the female protagonist, Angela, gets dragged away by the original zombie. At the beginning of REC 2 we see that last bit again. So Angela is under the bed like so:



Then she gets dragged away screaming and the title of the movie "REC 2" appears on the screen.

In REC we had discovered that there was some connection with the Catholic Church just before the end. A couple of other things which may have struck you as odd are, firstly that the thing in the attic hadn't looked the same as the zombie wandering around swinging a hammer in the dark. (The latter looked something like the image below...)



Secondly, there's a section of the movie where an infected child seems more sinister than simply ravenous like an animal. The scene where this happens:



So we have had clues that the infection is something more than just a viral outbreak and we've had clues that the Church is involved. It should come as no surprise that this develops somewhat in the sequel and the direction shouldn't come as too much of a surprise.

While the first movie was quite serious in its approach, the sequel is quite silly really. It's quite clear that the director has had a lot of fun in scenes where, say, snipers are destroying various parts of the set or where there is atmosphere-building interference with the camera. As always, the zombies look quite awesome and we spend more time up close to them this time around.

Anyway, once Angela's fate at the end of REC is replayed at the beginning we are introduced to a special unit team who we will be following from now on. Each of them has a camera on their helmet. There's a bit more of a multi-camera aspect this time around, but anything we see has to come from a camera somewhere.

Some people have oddly criticised this movie for introducing too much religious stuff, but what they seem to fail to appreciate is the negative judgement it appears to make on the Church. Let's not forget that at the end of the last movie we could tell that the Church was somehow responsible for the outbreak. That hasn't changed and the work done in that room on the top floor seems, if anything, dodgier. Sure in order for the Church to be somehow responsible for an zombie outbreak, it appears to require taking the truth of certain religious beliefs for granted. However, once we've taken for granted zombies, I don't think this is really so much of a leap. Meanwhile experimenting on children is hardly going to look terribly good and this side of things is somewhat explored.

Has REC2 got the same kind of atmosphere? Well, to be honest, the first REC movie wasn't the scare-fest for me that everyone claimed it was. I absolutely adored it and consider it to be one of, if not the, best zombie movies I've ever seen. I loved the way it explored the characters, the menace of the zombies and the clever way it established the atmosphere. I'm not sure they are quite so good at keeping the use of the camera realistic this time around, particularly in the final scene. However, I'd say that they still do that better in this sequel than the movie "Cloverfield" did. REC 2 still has some good characters, but none of them are so well explored. The plot doesn't seem to build this time, but simply seems to shift from one event to another. That's not to say it is boring though. The movie still keeps your interest and it's great fun, but it's not as clever as its predecessor.

There is one scene where things get quite silly and it pretty much seems that "magic" has been introduced. Blaming this on the inclusion of religion would be ridiculous. Religious and non-religious viewers alike will be saying "y'what?" at this late stage. However, within the logic of the movie itself it works fine, so long as you've recognised by that point that this movie isn't so serious as its predecessor. The expert who is brought in to lead our team of special unit police reveals a secret about himself early on which makes it very clear that this is all going to be a bit daft. The sad thing is that this section of exposition serves to distance the viewer from the action somewhat, since it thoroughly fails to pull us in. However, what happens instead is that it serves to set the tone. Things are going to get very creepy very quickly and there isn't going to be the same level of suspense we found in the previous movie.

Since this follows from the last movie, we weren't really able to have the same "how much worse are things going to get?" feeling. Things had already got as bad as they were going to get. Everyone in the house is a zombie and the whole place is a death trap. Sending some people in there and just having them gradually get picked off by zombies was going to have limited scope. Instead, this movie surprises us by making us wonder what could possibly happen next. Going a little over the top in places was a price worth paying for a sequel which really takes us by surprise in a number of ways. No one could reasonably claim that this movie was too predictable.

In the end this is a good solid sequel. Like all sequels, it was going to have a tough time living up to its predecessor. It's not one of the best films of 2009, but it is great fun, well worth watching and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. :)

4/5