It kicks off where the first one ended – with a small SWAT squad and a cagey medical officer entering a quarantined apartment block to assess the situation and contain a virus that turns humans into über-violent flesh-munchers.
The film doesn’t provide much backstory, so it’s worth watching [REC] first. But it won’t prepare you for what’s to come.
Not content with scaring audiences shitless with violent set pieces, directors Jaume Balagueró and Paco Plaza make this film mentally stimulating by explaining where the undeadly disease originally came from.
They’ve also made technical changes. The single point of view shot used to chilling effect in [REC] has been replaced by a multi-camera perspective, and while you might think that adding more angles would dilute the in-your-face intensity of the scares, it punctuates the overall atmosphere of dread with moments of pure, jump-out-of-your-skin adrenaline.
[REC] 2 is one of those rare horror flicks that’ll give you recurring nightmares. It reinforces Balagueró and Plaza’s status as maestros of macabre cinema – the kind that you’ll definitely need a change of underpants for.