(Vendetta Films)

Where’s John Constantine when you need him?

Spanish horror flick [REC] seemed like a breath of fresh air when it came out in 2007. Like Cloverfield, the gimmick of having characters running around recording the action worked well in terms of framing the events (and at that point seemed not quite so overused). While [REC] was ostensibly a zombie film (albeit with the new 28 Days Later/Dead Set-style of sprinting ‘infected’), [REC]²  ups The Exorcist quotient, as we learn the ‘zombies’ are in fact the puppets of a malicious demon.

Starting in effect a few minutes before the end of its predecessor, [REC]²  introduces a SWAT team headed towards the quarantined apartment building. Assigned to protect a representative from the Ministry Of Health (who is a bit more than he seems), the team enters the building and all the living hell it contains. At the same time a group of teens with a camera sneak into the block via the sewers, not realising that it contains a little more adventure than they can handle. This allows for two sets of cameras to capture the action, but also doesn’t allow much room (if any) for character development. Which, aside from the tendency to fall into moments of video game first-person-shooter territory (seriously – I thought I was watching a game demo at more than one point), is the film’s biggest flaw. It has tension, it has inventive camera-work and effects, a ridiculously over-the-top premise (in a good way), but not a single character to genuinely fear for. If there’s a [REC]³ and we finally get out of the building, hopefully we’ll have reasons to give a damn if Barcelona gets overrun by the possessed.

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TOPHER HEALY

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