The Bedbugs Aren't the Only Things Biting

Quick Plot: Cesar is works as the concierge at an expensive apartment building in Barcelona. While his days consist of opening doors and feeding the stomach-sensitive dogs of his tenants, his nights are little more sinister.

Cesar, you see, cannot be happy. Whereas some men would try therapy or overload on sugar, Cesar's solution to his intensely ambivalent life is to find whatever pleasure he can in the unhappiness of others. Especially if he's the one who causes it.

Enter Clara, a pretty and bubbly young tenant who exits the building every day with a smile and warm thank you. She's the kind of woman you're glad  to have as a neighbor, a genuinely nice soul with as sunny a disposition as you can find.

Naturally, Cesar plots to tear it all away.

What follows is a progressively sick little game of sadism. Every night, Cesar sneaks into Clara's bedroom and dopes her with chloroform, enjoying how she groggily wakes up later and later the following morning. He clogs her sink, planting a beloved family heirloom there just so he can rust it up with Drano. He sends anonymous love letters and text messages with a creepy, ominous slant and creates a fully armed cockroach invasion without batting an eye.

Cesar is a bad man.

And yet, we see everything through his point of view, meaning that as much as we want him to get caught, we're also hesitant since doing so would end the movie and our camera view. 

Written by Alberto Marini and directed by Jaume Balaguero (one half of REC and REC 2), Sleep Tight is a film that doesn't play nice. Cesar is a cruel man, one who enjoys tormenting the innocent Clara while also verbally unraveling a nice, lonely older woman who made the mistake of thinking he was her friend. A scene where he quietly tells that tenant that her life is empty, never raising his voice to do so, provides some of the most unsettling minutes I've ever spent with a film.

He's a monster, plain and true. But as he makes his midnight calls to a radio show on the roof of his building, flirting every evening with the possibility of suicide, it's clear to us that the only cure for Cesar's chronic misery is indeed making others feel the same way. It's sick and sad, especially since his target is a truly good person. But perhaps that's what makes the movie such an effective little slice of cruel.

High Points

A featurette on the DVD includes an interview where the screenwriter discusses some of the revision process, including the fact that several subplots were cut before filming. Excellent decision. Because Sleep Tight is seen entirely from Cesar's eyes, the film moves with incredibly tense momentum. It also prevents Cesar from becoming a typical villain, since we rely so much on his perspective to follow the story. Had the script bounced around with minor characters, Cesar might have been reduced to a simpler monster and not the fascinating character he ultimately is

Speaking of, as Cesar, Luis Tosar nails it

Low Points

Credit to the film for its ending, but OUCH

Lessons Learned

Nanny cams aren't just for nannies you know

Never pair a potato pancake with a French bulldog

Kids today are getting very crafty about their blackmail demands

Rent/Bury/Buy

I won't be eager to revisit Sleep Tight anytime soon, but some years down the line, I look forward to seeing how it plays upon repeat viewing. It's disturbing on a very unique level, sort of like a lighter version of Michael Haneke's Cache or a calmer version of The Vanishing. Except maybe not at all. Point is, Sleep Tight is well worth a watch, as is the making-of feature included on the DVD. Quiet horror at its best.

How Do You Say 'Bridezilla' In Spanish?

Although it doesn't feel quite as original today, 2007's REC made a well-deserved splash on the genre world at the time of its debut, less for its then-new concept (found footage fast running zombies in a quarantined apartment) than for the simple fact that it was a well-made, well-acted, effectively staged and ultimately scary little movie. Its sequel proved to be equally ambitious, especially in expanding the mysterious nature of its viral-infused cannibal killers and finding fresh ideas to keep the occasionally nauseating first-person camerawork working within the context of its story.

While REC and REC2 were co-directed by Jaume Balaguero and Paco Plaza, REC3 sees a split, with Plaza (he the man behind the wonderfully fresh The Christmas Tale from the 6 Films To Keep You Awake series) taking solo reins.

Apparently, he's the funny one.

Quick Plot: Koldo and Clara are enjoying a very loving, slightly tacky wedding on the Spanish countryside. Among the guests is Koldo's genial uncle Victor wearing a conspicuous bandage over his wrist. When asked about his wound, he innocently explains that he was bit by a dog at a veterinarian's office, a red flag alert for anyone who's watched the first two films in this franchise.

After the cake is cut (with a conveniently intimidating samurai sword no less), the guests notice the seemingly drunk Victor hanging over a bannister on the second floor. When he topples over, they rush to his aide only to, you know, become immediate victims of a fast moving zombie rabies possession virus.

Our story then divides itself between our bride and groom, who are frantically separated in the chaos on the quickly bloodening dance floor. Both vow to find one another again, especially following the not at all expected revelation that Clara is expecting.

If you have seen the first two REC films (which surprisingly, you don't actually need to do to enjoy this one) there are certain series tropes you've probably come to expect. Most notably would be the found footage style that defined the first film and was utilized with some creative tricks in its sequel. The biggest gripe from many a viewer regarding REC3 will probably come here. While the first twenty or so minutes are shown to us--quite effectively and very humorously--through the lens of a wedding guest's camera, the film abruptly abandons this style when the real action kicks in. Following that, we get spurts of other media--night vision mode on a camcorder, security footage in black and white--but ultimately, the bulk of REC3 is filmed in a standard manner.

I am okay with this.

Narratively, it's a cheat. Why bother giving us a wedding guest's POV if you have no plans to follow through with it? you might ask. Well, says I, mostly to spare your audience a 50 minute headache and lingering sense of nausea. I've come around on found footage and admit that it now defines some of this generation's best independent horror cinema, but at the same time, I still find it, on a physical level, rather unpleasant to sit through. Like District 9, REC3 breaks its own rule with no real excuse but when the benefit lies in the viewer, how can you really complain?

The other major shift comes in the general tone, which is almost all-out horror comedy. Director Plaza never hesitates to give us heartfelt deaths or moments of genuine tragedy, but most of the action is done with a wink. The film doesn't quite cross Evil Dead 2 lines of bonkers, but it flirts with the barrier in a fresh and fun way. It's both tense and gross when a wedding guest starts chewing on a bridesmaid's face, but when you throw in a drunk man dressed as a knockoff version of SpongeBob Squarepants wielding a shotgun, you can't not laugh at the absurdity. 

I'm not sure that Plaza perfectly balances the gruesome violence with the humor, but the result is ultimately a truly enjoyable 80 minutes of high energy zombie fun. Grounding it all is the sweet central romance that manages to keep us strongly invested in the leads' fates.

High Points
It's always nice to see a strong female lead in a horror film, and Leticia Doler's Clara is a pleasantly pro-active (and impressively resourceful) surprise

As much as REC3 feels a tad more comedy than horror, it still manages to produce some genuinely unnerving moments, including the beyond tragic fate of a shuttle bus captured in hauntingly black and white security footage

Low Points
The aforementioned found footage switcharoo should have been a tad more justified

The Jury's Out
I'm sure I wasn't alone in cheering on Clara as she slashed at her now bloodied wedding gown with a kickass chainsaw. It's a wonderful moment that yields a grand poster-ready sight. But aside from it referencing Alice's asymmetrical red number in the first Resident Evil film, is there any reason she wouldn't circulate that cut for full mobility?

Lessons Learned
When choosing your wedding venue, be sure to consider such important factors as its number of decorative armored knights

Fire hoses are the most versatile of all zombie hunting/escaping weapons

The term 'MILF' transcends language barriers

Rent/Bury/Buy
While REC can nudge its way onto the always arguable lists of best modern horror films, REC3 will probably be the one I and other movie fans revisit more. This isn't a great genre film, but it has so much fun with itself that by the end, I couldn't resist it. Don't expect the frantic pacing and horror of its predecessors, but check it out when you're in the mood for lighter (but equally bloody) fare.

Kevin Costner Gets a New Daughter

It fills my little heart with high joy to see modern filmmakers embracing the always potent, sometimes cruelly dismissed killer kid subgenre. With some serious Spanish pedigree behind The New Daughter, the siren song of Netflix Instant called my name.

Quick Plot: Meet the James, a uniquely unhappy family who move into a far too splendid country home in South Carolina after Mrs. James up and left town with her lover. Dad John is a distracted novelist with no real clue how to connect to his moody tweenage daughter Louisa (Pan’s Labyrinth’s Ivana Banquero), better luck with 7-year-old Sam, and poor skills keeping the indoor cat from sneaking outside and being discovered in two bloody halves.

RIP

Maybe such carnage, coupled with Louisa’s increasingly strange behavior, has something to do with the giant Indian burial mounds (not grounds) hanging out in the backyard. By ‘maybe,’ I mean ‘yes, yes it does.’

Directed by REC and A Christmas Tale scribe Luiso Berdejo, The New Daughter is a solidly average modern genre film. While some touches are unique, virtually every beat feels culled from a catalog of movies that have already explored alternate possession. Big mysterious house (check). 

Alienated teen (check). 

Missing parental figure (check). 


Ill-fated babysitter (check). 

Pretty and perfect love interest for newly single parent (check).

Even a middle school bully with blonder than blonde hair shows up with two things to do: be mean and fall down the stairs. Because let’s face it: that’s what blonder than blonde tweenagers DO in these kinds of movies.

At the same time, The New Daughter fares far better than similarly direct-to-DVD-esque horror. Costner is a few spoons away from Robin Hood, but it’s pleasant enough to see him turn up here. Young Gattlin Griffith avoids being annoying as the token annoying younger brother, and while Louisa is a far less interesting role than Banqero’s past work, the young actress continues to prove herself as she grows up. So that’s good.

And hey, Berdejo isn’t incompetent when it comes to creating scares. Early hints regarding what’s in these southern woods are dropped in creative and eerie ways, while the first major bout of violence is cleverly staged behind a pounding front door. Even the design of the film’s ultimate baddies has something going for it.

But…but…I don’t know. There’s also a pounding sense of triteness about The New Daughter that built some kind of wall between itself and me as an actively engaged viewer. I was curious more than involved.

High Points

An early sneak appearance of a crafty wood creature is executed with great jumpiness

Low Points

Thou shalt not waste the talents of the supremely talented and far underrated Noah Taylor. It’s in the/my bible and everything

Draw

In going through my notes, I’m realizing that The New Daughter left me feeling more manic than any film since Shattered Lives. There were plenty of moments where I started off thinking I’d seen what Berdejo was trying to do before, only to then conclude that it worked. Likewise, there were plenty of OTHER moments where the flip happened: a creepy spider inside a straw doll scene, for example, where logic plus an overpowering soundtrack tells you the payoff before it comes. It seems like the ideas and talent WERE there, but The New Daughter was ultimately a tad too timid to really step outside convention to deliver anything overly new

Lessons Learned

Girls don’t like jerky...for dinner

Seven years old is apparently not old enough to know the meaning of the word ‘sucks’

One way to tune that piano: remove the loaded shotgun hiding inside

Montage Mania

If you’ve ever longed to see Kevin Costner free associate through Google terms like “raising teenage daughters,” “odd behavior, daughter,” “daughter, changes,” and “crappy dad,” this is clearly the movie for you

Rent/Bury/Buy

Meh. The New Daughter is a decent thrill of a horror film, but it never quite breaks into true scary territory. This would be tolerable if it knew well enough to have fun with itself, but like many overly ambitious, mediocre-ly executed films, it takes itself far too seriously. It’s a more than passable instant watch when you want something new and not terrible, but I’d advise against a blind buy. Berdejo proves himself capable as a filmmaker, but let’s hope he gets a little braver by taking more chances in his next work.

Those Air Miles Are Running Out Faster Than a Running Not Zombie!

Before I get to Quarantine 2: Terminal, allow me to be confused. Much like REC2 (you know, the sequel to the original film that inspired Quarantine but the sequel of which is not the basis for Quarantine 2: Terminal), the DVD opens with an advertisement for the grandeur of Blu Ray, which seems a little self-defeating when you’re going to watch it, you know, on DVD. 

Moving on, we then get to watch a preview for REC2, which is a sequel to the film that inspired Quarantine but not the film of which you’re about to watch. So don’t worry: you’re NOT watching a preview for the film you’re about to watch but in Spanish. Now if it were Quarantine (1), you would be. But you’re not, so--

Sometimes I get confused by things that don’t need to be confusing. Tyra Banks would say that I overthink. But we’ll get back to Tyra Banks in the middle of Quarantine 2: Terminal, which is a sequel--I guess--to the American film Quarantine, which was a remake of REC, which had a sequel that is unrelated to Quarantine 2: Terminal.

It's really confusing. I know.

Quick Plot: A bunch of stereotyp--er, characters--board a plane leaving LA. Amongst the rather skimpy batch of passengers are

-A crass fat guy who instantly mentions beer

-A video game playing teenagers who’s all “I don’t need YOU”

-An attractive young woman with medical experience

-A crazy old cat lady

-A couple who have accents and a video camera

-A workaholic with a laptop

-A pregnant woman

-Her asshole husband

-A young man with a good enough looking face to successfully flirt with the cute stewardess

-Hamsters

After some okay-to-forced airplane banter that establishes every character’s main trait, we catch The Crass Fat Guy vomiting up a storm. Before you can say drink cart, we’ve got rabid fast running ‘let’s argue about whether they’re zombie’ zombies as our plane lands in the titular terminal. Since the other part of the title here is ‘quarantine,’ we then get some government types sealing off the passengers and plucky flight attendant Jenny (Lea Michelle lookalike Mercedes Masohn) trying to survive in a warehouse. 

What else do we get, you ask? There’s conspiracies of course. HAZMAT suit wearing shlubs wheeled onscreen to give us exposition before getting shot. Some in-fighting, some animal attacks. The plucky stewardess rising to the occasion with her hair still shining bright enough for a Pantene commercial. Thermal night vision goggles because I guess it’s some sort of nod to the found footage aspect of its predecessor. 

That kind of stuff.

Like most of the horror fans I know, I rather enjoyed REC and was pleasantly surprised by its recent sequel. Sure, I felt Quarantine was unnecessary, but it was a decent cash-in that worked well enough for Americans with reluctant reading habits. A sequel didn’t NOT make sense, but a slicker version of Flight of the Living Dead doesn’t. 

Excuse me. I have to pause for the next hour to watch the season premiere of America’s Next Top Model: All Stars.

Brittany was unfairly eliminated. Girls screamed a lot. Tyra pulled a Sybil and it was more painful than it sounds.

We’re back to not zombie zombies.

And they run. And they bite. And drool. And stare straight at the camera to make those “garrrowwwww” noises. Because that’s how these things work.

There are few surprises in Quarantine 2: Terminal, though they do eventually come (see my spoiler alerted high point). It’s certainly a competent film, one executed more than decently by John Pogue (the apparent maestro behind the Yale horror Skulls series). The acting is more than passable, the gore gooey and believable, and pacing quite strong. But you know...there are zombies and they attack a diverse assortment of movie types in the exact order you expect. Some of us like that kind of thing. Others yawn.

High Points

MINOR SPOILER

What can I say? I do love me a secret subplot involving doomsday cults

MAJOR SPOILER

Yup, the pretty girl gets it. But her hair made it to the end.

Low Points

When you put a pregnant woman in the victim pool, you’d expect something tragic or exciting or different to happen to her, no? Yeah, but I guess writer director John Pogue did not

Is it a cinematic law that any film involving an airline must use the phrase “put your trays in the upright position” when making a sexual innuendo? Also note that this line is used by female flight attendants discussing oral sex on a cute passenger, but I suppose everything is okay since they follow the comment up with “The cute guy is really smart.” And yes, this does indeed make me think back to the recent Miss Universe pageant, where the plastic correspondents were overwhelmingly impressed to learn that one of the contestants can even PICK UP a newspaper

Lessons Learned

In flight attendant speak, engaged does not equal dead. In horror movie speak, it just means not dead until 30 minutes into the film 

Hamsters don’t have tails...HAMSTERS DON’T HAVE TAILS!

It’s apparently quite simple to pack a gun and ammo inside your baggage when traveling by plane

Time is really expensive nowadays

The Winning Line

Dude 1: Shit!

Dude 2: It’s just blood.

That’s cool right?

Rent/Bury/Buy

Quarantine 2: Terminal is fine. I don’t mean fine in a ‘girrrrrrrrrrrl, you so FINE’ kind of way. I mean it as ‘yeah, ya know, it’s okay, no sweat, it’s fine.’ You know, in other words, the white person way. As zombie films goes, it’s better than your average straight-to-DVD flick, but in no way does it do anything new or special. Even the plane angle was done before--and with more fun--in 2007 with Flight of the Living Dead, and THAT film had the bad guy from Kindergarden Cop in it. The film will eventually make a decent enough Instant Watch, but it doesn’t really deserve much else. 

Unlike Kindergarten Cop, which deserves to be showered in diamonds and anointed as a saint