"Quarantine"

By: Matt Duncan
Coastal View News

If come Oct. 31, you see a dark, deserted corridor covered in dust and cobwebs with creepy noises emanating from deep within, you are most likely in one of two places: a haunted house or in a theater watching a horror flick. True to form, “Quarantine” will get your heart pumping and blood curdling. Although the plot makes hardly any sense, and the aura falls short of terrifying, this film’s horrific images and shocking jump scenes are true to the Halloween spirit.

Reporter Angela Vidal (Jennifer Carpenter) and her cameraman Scott Percival (Steve Harris) gear up for a special segment on the Los Angeles Fire Department. When the bell rings and firefighters fly down their pole, the aspiring Vidal is thrilled to be part of some real action, even if it turns out to be nothing more than rescuing a kitten from a tree. But when they arrive at an apartment complex curiously designed like a haunted mansion, it quickly becomes clear that this is no routine call.

As the camera keeps rolling, a crazed resident who is foaming at the mouth attacks one of the firefighters. Panic ensues and tensions dial up when, on their way out of the house to get their injured friend to a hospital, police close the doors and lock the group inside the complex. No explanation is given.

Eventually it becomes clear that the group is being quarantined from the rest of the city because it is suspected that a deadly virus is loose in the building. A resident who also happens to be a veterinarian recognizes the symptoms as resembling rabies, but with one twist: instead of taking hours or days for symptoms to show up, bitten or infected victims become rabid in just minutes.

A battle between the infected and uninfected develops, turning a compassionate group of people who desire the well being of everyone into a desperate army fighting against what looks like a growing cohort of zombies. The police will not let anyone out of the building, at least not while anyone is alive. Those who remain uninfected struggle to find a way out before they too fall victim to their former compatriots.

Just like the spider-webbed, zombie-ridden halls of a haunted house, “Quarantine” was not crafted to make much sense; it was crafted to frighten an audience. Viewers may wonder, for example, why the police insisted on closing off the building when the virus is only transmitted through blood or saliva, instead of isolating the lone victim and thereby saving the rest of the group.

But logic is no reason to watch a horror film. When it comes to Halloween movies, each has plenty of blood and gore, but for a horror flick to leave a real impression, a few things need to be accomplished. First, there needs to be a bit of mystery. It is important for the audience to be kept guessing, whether that is done with shaky cameras, dark corridors or mysterious occurrences. Second, there needs to be a real sense of isolation or hopelessness. In other words, an audience needs to feel like the actors and actresses are alone in the world and completely vulnerable. Finally, for a horror movie to be truly horrific, there needs to be a sense of grandeur in the enemy. This grandeur could be something quasi-ideological as in psycho movies, something paranormal as in exorcist or alien movies, or something apocalyptic as in virus movies or doomsday flicks.

Most of the mystery was taken out of “Quarantine” once the group knew that something like rabies was infecting certain members. One would think that isolation was a given, seeing as how that is pretty much the definition of quarantine, however, the fact that the desperate group was separated from the rest of the world only by a thin layer of concrete or stucco diminished the sense of loneliness. Finally, the sense of grandeur only really picks up at the end of “Quarantine.” What is left is a startling and disturbing set of shots captured on an eerie reel of film. This movie is grotesque, and succeeds in transporting the audience into a deep mood of anxiety over imagining taking a step into that horrible place.

All in all, “Quarantine” is not all that great of a movie, but will do the job if what you are looking for this Halloween is a few decent screams.

"Choke"

By: Matt Duncan
Coastal View News

It's rare that a deity and a scoundrel are one and the same. Victor Mancini (Sam Rockwell) is not sure where the needle on his self-assessment barometer lies, but he has a strong feeling that it is not somewhere in the middle; either that or the barometer is broken. “Choke”—an off-color comedy based off a novel by Chuck Palahniuk, author or “Fight Club”—is an eccentric look at a man incapable of being satisfied. Although amusing and interesting, this film is likely to leave audiences, like the protagonist, just short of fulfilled.

Victor is a sex addict, and an ornery one at that. He utilizes any setting—from rehabilitation classes to the colonial pasture where he works as a reenactment tour guide—to sate his insatiable impulses. However, Victor’s life does not revolve solely around lewd and superficial behavior. He also scams the wealthy by pretending to choke on his meal while in high-end restaurants; a move that Victor finds endears him to potential financial backers.

To be fair, Victor does have a nobler side. He spends his money, both earned and scammed, to help pay for his mother Ida (Anjelica Huston) to be hospitalized in an expensive treatment center for individuals suffering from dementia. Because Ida does not recognize her son, Victor assumes a variety of roles as a way to interact with his mother in the hospital.

The story takes a turn when Ida hints at the identity of Victor’s father, a bit of information Victor is desperate to learn about. With the help of his sex-addict friend Denny (Brad William Henke) and a tempting nurse named Paige (Kelly Macdonald), Victor seeks to find out about his past, all the while flashing back to his chaotic childhood.

As the story unfolds and more information about Victor’s past is revealed, the details of his parentage take on Biblical proportions. Still convinced that he is the scum of the earth, Victor has reason to doubt claims that he may be of divine origin.

Victor is used to being the lying cheat, and thus incorporates his character flaws into what he expects from the world. He expects to be treated as the liar, and the audience does too—after all, he deserves it, right? As it turns out, this deeply flawed person is quite a bit more honest than those around him. The juxtapositions created by ironies of this sort cause viewers to question the legitimacy of distinctions like ‘sinner’ versus ‘saint’, ‘helper’ versus ‘helpless’. Although Victor’s character is tossed from the gutter to the clouds and back again, Victor finds himself somewhere in between, or perhaps not on the scale at all.

“Choke” is as odd as it is lewd. The many-layered story is more coherent beneath the surface than it is at face value. The humor is quirky, smart and delivered well. Although “Choke” does not come close to the merits of “Fight Club” it has its own charm and might be worth watching if you have the patience and stomach to see the story play out. This movie had more potential than the final product delivered, but perhaps not a great deal more. Some of the more outlandish plot developments, which carried a minor thematic load, were probably too cliché, oddly enough, to be worthwhile. The sum total is only slightly more worthwhile.

“Choke” is rated R for strong sexual content, nudity and language.