REC 3: Genesis

REC 3: Genesis Movie Review

All hell breaks loose at a wedding reception and it’s not because your Uncle Eddie is wasted and dancing the Macarena.  No, it’s because he’s a zombie!  Or demon…or whatever he is in this installment of the REC quadrilogy “REC 3: Genesis.”

This is the first film in the series that Spanish director Paco Plaza made without the help of Jaume Balaguero, the co-director of the first two REC films.  The result is a fresh new perspective that stays true to the original plot; this film takes place during the day, uses a fiction style camera and has a nice touch of humor throughout that doesn’t take away from the terror.  This movie is not a zomcom (zombie-comedy) but let’s face it, certain things are going to happen in the course of a horrific event that might seem funny to those watching from the comfort of their own home and this movie capitalizes on many of them perfectly. This doesn’t mean that all the great draws of the first two films are absent however, there is a wedding videographer roaming around and we frequently cut to his view and eventually it does get dark which helps intensify the atmosphere.  What definitely hasn’t changed is the ravenous and ever growing horde of zombies….or infected….or demons….or whatever the hell you want to call them.

 

To sum them all up I am going to call them ZOMBIEMONS…a combination of zombies and demons.  Did Gory Gary just coin a new horror term?  I think he did!   It’s like it started with a cult that infected people but once they kill, the dead reanimate like zombies…zombies that heed to religious commands.  It is some seriously weird stuff, man!  These things, or ZOMBIEMONS if you will, are terrifying, fast and hungry—all bad when you’re trying to run for your life.  The gore is excellent and uses all practical effects, which we love here at the BOT.

As a filmmaker myself and someone who has shot many, many wedding videos (currently editing two) this couple was totally believable as loving, caring sweethearts.  The bride Clara, played by Leticia Dolera, and the groom Koldo, played by Diego Martin do a terrific job of straddling the line between horror and happiness.  In foreign films acting is a difficult thing to judge but I think these two definitely pulled it off well but what I took issue with was how easily they were able to kill their family members and friends who had turned into zombiemons.  I get it, they are fighting for their lives, but it’s going to be hard for me to kill my uncle Eddie because I love the guy and he got me drunk my first time and paid for my first tattoo!  Case and point it’s not going to be that easy to kill many people at your wedding unless it’s your sister’s douche bag fiancé.

“Rec 3:Genesis” is rated R has a run time of 80 horrifying minutes and gets a 4 out of 5 stars on the gore score.  This one has everything we loved from the first two with a few extra buckets of blood to keep you interested.  We have enjoyed each film so far in this series and are really looking forward to its conclusion in Rec 4: Apocalypse.