Gore
[REC]3 Génesis
I arrived at this film with high hopes. The first [REC] is a film I absolutely love. Studying Spanish and being mad-keen on zombie films, it seemed almost too good to be true that one of the twenty-first century’s best zombie films was filmed by two Spanish directors in an appartment block in Barcelona. It’s a powerful, scary zombie film (that staircase death!) that managed to breath new life into both the zombie and the found-footage genres. Impressive stuff.
The second in the series was by no means as good but it was still streets ahead of most of the competition. Balaguero and Plaza played around with the restrictions of the found-footage film, spiced up the zombies with a bit more religion (not to everyone’s taste) and spent their obviously increased budget on quantities of guns and gore. More impressive stuff.
Coming to the third instalment, then, my hopes were high. Almost worryingly high. I’m pretty sure that at some point Balaguero and Plaza had said they intended to stop after the second but, given its commercial success, rights-holders Filmmax said they’d continue with other directors in that case (I might have imagined this. But I think it happened). Whatever the details of the scenario, B+P did sign up to do more [REC] films but planned two more, of which they would direct one each, rather than co-directing as before. [REC]3 is Plaza’s segment. It takes place, as far as I can tell, at roughly the same time as the first film. What seemed like an isolated outbreak clearly wasn’t…
It opens in the now-familiar shaky-camera style. We’re at the wedding of Koldo and Clara. As the family and friends move on to the reception, however, it emerges that the Uncle’s dog-bite may be infected. Badly. Coughing blood and staggering, there are no prizes for guessing what happens next. It is, essentially, all fairly predictable. We’re ushered into a secure location (country house), introduced to the characters/victims (wedding guests) and then a zombie is thrown into the mix and all hell breaks loose.
That said, [REC]3 handles it all pretty well. The country house makes a refreshing change from the apartment block of before, the characters are (mostly) intelligent and likeable and, most crucially of all, the gore is good. Some cruel, splattery deaths are dealt to zombies and humans alike, characters are killed off, heads and limbs are hacked at. It’s gleeful, bloody stuff (which is exactly what we want, right?)
It’s certainly not as innovative or as well-crafted as the first film, I’ll accept that, but I’d say that it gave [REC]2 a pretty close run. [REC]3 is a well-made, straight-faced, zombie-movie. And I enjoyed it a lot.
Short Films: Treevenge
It’s hard to know what to say about a short film as funny, gory, mad and wonderful as Treevenge.
The short, clocking in at about 16 minutes, is a couple of years old and comes recommended by a sackful of film festival awards, including an honourable mention at Sundance and audience-fave short at Torronto After Dark, as well as Best Short from Rue Morgue magazine.
I can see why!
The premise, though nothing especially inventive, is enjoyable and clearly gave the film-makers enormous scope to have some fun. It’s Christgmas, the goose is getting fat, and all over Canada Christmas trees are being butchered by chainsaw-wielding, slack-jawed lumberjacks intent on inflicting maximum pain on the poor trees. After a very funny opening with snarling mencutting up hilariously subtitled and squealing trees, we see the trees brought into the typical family home, ready for the “best Christmas EVER!”
I think you know what follows. Several minutes of top-notch, tongue-in-cheek, laugh-out-loud slaughter, splatter and gore as the enraged trees go on a killing rampage, wreaking havoc upon their would-be tormentors.
It’s gory, it’s funny and it’s beautiful. I can’t recommend it highly enough.
The whole thing, in it’s 16minute glory, is available to watch on youtube here, or embedded below. I *presume* Yer Dead films don’t mind it being there, and I can’t see any purchase details on their website.