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(2009)
Directed by Jaume Balagueró & Paco Plaza
Starring Manuela Velasco, Ferran Terraza, Pablo Rosso, Javier Botet, Claudia Font, Jonathan Mellor, Martha Carbonell, Nico Baixas, Andrea Ros, Ariel Casas

First off this review will not have any spoilers for either this film or the first film, so don’t worry if you haven’t seen them. We’re not going to be able to go into a lot of detail about it because of that, so we’ll do our best to let you know what we thought anyway.

When we had first watched the original [REC], we had no idea what the movie was about. All we knew was that it was a new Spanish horror movie. So when the proverbial shit starts hitting the fan, we were blown away. So much in fact, that we could deal with the shaky-cam cinematography that we generally can’t stand.

But let’s get to the sequel at hand. We will say that the first film had a sort of a cliff hanger of an ending. [REC] 2 starts off right at the end of the first film. In fact, they even replay the ending again, just to refresh the viewer’s mind. The first film is told through the use a TV reporter’s camera recording everything. In the sequel, the cameras used are the ones being used by the police SWAT team that goes in there to investigate. One of the team carries a regular camera, while the rest of the team has mini-cameras attached to their helmets. While reminiscent of ALIENS, the idea still works. Along with them is a member of the medical field. But what they discover, as do we, is that what we thought was going on during the first film turns out NOT to be what we thought. Make sense? Maybe by the end of the sequel you’ll know….or maybe not.

I give Balagueró and Plaza, who co-directed as well as co-wrote the movie, along with Manu Díez, a lot of credit for taking their first film somewhere completely different with the story. But the problem is that the film itself is exactly the same, just really just a continuation of the first film. Doesn’t really mean it’s a bad thing, mind you, since if you liked the first film, you should like this one. But the “scariness” of the film, with the shaky camera and these zombies/creatures/monsters running at the camera worked really well in the first one to develop some pretty creepy shots and atmosphere. But here, we get the same thing. Not to say that it’s still not effective, but that effect seems to be a lessened since we’ve already been-there, done-that. It’s really more of continuation of the film as oppose to a sequel.

One of the nice things about being the sequel, there’s no waiting for the action or horror element element to kick in, like in the first one. It starts off pretty much right away. There is a little bit a slowing done when the movie backtracks to show us what has just happened from some other characters perspective. Nice idea since it does fill in some wholes.

But since the story line does change, that may lose some fans. As I said, I liked that they did a nice twist on what really is going on in this apartment building and the people trapped inside, though not sure if I liked their new “spin” on it. It’s one that I’m sure will be debated amongst horror fans for while.

Being a huge fan of Balagueró’s work, and have always been impressed with what he's done, I would recommend seeing this film if for any reason to support the Spanish horror genre. If you have seen the first film and hated it, then going to this one is going to bring the same results. But if you did enjoy it, I think you’ll enjoy this entry as well.