"Quarantine" - a Real Horror Film

This weekend, I rented some DVD movies from Blockbuster Video. I rented "High School Music 3: Senior Year;" and "Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa" for my daughter. I rented "Soul Men;" and "Quarantine" for me. My favorite DVD, of course is "Quarantine." It begins with reporter, Angela Vidal (Jennifer Carpenter) and her cameraman, Scott Percival (Steve Harris) doing a report on the courageous firefighters on the night shift at a Los Angeles fire station. They are introduced to firefighters, Fletcher (Johnathon Schaech) and Jake (Jay Hernandez), whom they follow throughout the evening.

Their night begins when they receive a call concerning a medical emergency at an apartment complex. Yuri, the building manager, tells them that a woman has been screaming, scaring the tenants. They are also joined by two police officers, James and Danny. The screaming woman, Mrs. Espinoza is found in her apartment, struggling to breathe, covered in blood, and foaming at the mouth. As they open the door, a barking dog flees outside. Suddenly, she attacks and bites James in the neck, wounding him severely. As James is taken downstairs to get medical assistance, they find that the building is sealed shut by local authorities. Next, Fletcher suddenly falls from the top floor, after he was bitten on the leg.

After Danny and Jake go upstairs to get Mrs. Espinoza, they find the cleaning lady dead. Danny shoots Mrs. Espinoza as she lunges toward him like a wild animal. At this time, all exterior windows and doors are also being sealed by government officials. All cell phones, cable television, Internet service is cut off. No communication is available to the outside. Talk about total isolation! And to make matters worse, if anyone tries to leave, they are killed instantly by snipers, dressed in military attire. Now everyone is afraid and wondering what the heck is going on.

Meanwhile, Danny and Jake round up all the remaining tenants and bring them to the lobby, where Elise is displaying the same symptoms as Mrs. Espinoza. While Fletcher, James, and Elise are being treated by the vet, Lawrence, Angela starts interviewing the tenants. A little girl named Briana is also sick. Her mother says she just has a fever. Briana tells Angela she had a dog named Max, who was sick and was taken to the vet by her dad. Later, Lawrence informs everyone that the symptoms displayed by the tenants are similar to rabies, only more advanced.

Talk about frightening, this movie is it! And, the action is non-stop! Finally, the Center for Disease Control or CDC sends two agents inside to evaluate the situation but they only end up making things worse. As you guessed it, things get out-of-hand and Danny and Jake lose control of the building to infected, virus-stricken beings. Sadly, Danny is bitten by Briana, and many of the survivors are bitten as well. Now, the apartment building is flooded with zombie-like inhabitants.

Finally, Angela, Scott, and Jake make their way to Yuri's apartment to get his master keys, while avoiding being infected or killed. Jake is bitten by Yuri and the infected Danny chases the last two survivors, Angela and Scott. Well, fate leads them into the penthouse apartment, where they discover the mysterious man from Boston. They begin reading articles about a cult and how they broke into a military biological facility to steal the virus. Then, a noise from the attic prompts Scott to investigate and he finds an infected boy. Scott then turns on the night vision.

Next, Angela and Scott see an emaciated man who emerges from another room. When Scott makes a noise, he attacks him, knocks the camera out of his hands, and begins to eat him. Angela picks up the camera and sees the man eating Scott. She screams, provoking an attack on her. In the final scene, Angela is crawling toward the camera and is finally dragged into darkness, screaming. And, the only key to finding out what happened in that apartment is looking at the footage left behind on Scott's camera. Wow! What genius! This movie is rated R for bloody violent and disturbing content and terror.