Now Playing
Critics & Publications
Archives: A-Z Index
Advanced Search

Upcoming Release Calendar
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

sort by name

sort by score

53 Australia
34 Bedtime Stories
41 Beverly Hills Chihuahua
57 Body of Lies
68 Bolt
xx Bride Wars
63 Burn After Reading
65 Cadillac Records
58 City of Ember
69 Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The
82 Dark Knight, The
39 Day the Earth Stood Still, The
27 Delgo
43 Eagle Eye
36 Fly Me to the Moon
41 Four Christmases
28 Haunting of Molly Hartley. The
57 High School Musical 3: Senior Year
35 How to Lose Friends & Alienate People
57 Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D
61 Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa
53 Marley & Me
84 Milk
35 Mirrors
39 Nights in Rodanthe
50 Nothing Like the Holidays
45 Pride and Glory
30 Punisher: War Zone
58 Quantum of Solace
71 Revolutionary Road
36 Righteous Kill
60 Role Models
19 Saw V
57 Secret Life of Bees, The
36 Seven Pounds
49 Sex Drive
49 Soul Men
30 Spirit, The
53 Tale of Despereaux, The
51 Transporter 3
56 Twilight
xx Unborn, The
56 Valkyrie
70 Vicky Cristina Barcelona
56 W.
93 WALL-E
46 Yes Man
56 Zack and Miri Make a Porno

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

sort by name

sort by score

58 Adam Resurrected
64 Appaloosa
69 Ashes of Time Redux
68 August Evening
54 Battle in Seattle
76 Betrayal - Nerakhoon, The
70 Black Balloon, The
55 Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The
51 Breakfast with Scot
xx Cargo 200
63 Changeling
66 Che
84 Christmas Tale, A
93 Class, The
38 Dark Streets
57 Defiance
xx Dostana
70 Doubt
62 Duchess, The
46 Dukes, The
63 Eden
xx Extreme Movie
69 Fear(s) of the Dark
26 Filth and Wisdom
28 Fireproof
80 Frost/Nixon
43 Gardens of the Night
73 Girl Cut in Two, A
36 Good
54 Good Dick
73 Gran Torino
30 Guitar, The
84 Happy-Go-Lucky
31 Hounddog
26 House of the Sleeping Beauties
49 How About You
70 Hunger
72 I Served the King of England
70 I.O.U.S. A
40 Igor
79 I've Loved You So Long
64 JCVD
xx Just Another Love Story
29 Lake City
59 Last Chance Harvey
82 Let the Right One In
31 Let Them Chirp Awhile
xx Local Color
89 Man on Wire
74 Moscow, Belgium
36 My Name Is Bruce
28 Nobel Son
xx Not Easily Broken
64 Nothing But the Truth
40 Other End of the Line, The
34 Otto; or Up with Dead People
75 Pool, The
78 Pray the Devil Back to Hell
xx Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi
82 Rachel Getting Married
58 Reader, The
56 Religulous
32 Repo! The Genetic Opera
53 RocknRolla
64 Scott Walker: 30 Century Man
77 Secret of the Grain, The
84 Silent Light
86 Slumdog Millionaire
57 Special
80 Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains
67 Synecdoche, New York
82 Tell No One
68 Theater of War
65 Timecrimes
83 Trouble the Water
43 Tru Loved
83 U2 3D
88 Waltz with Bashir
59 We Are Wizards
80 Wendy and Lucy
71 What Doesn't Kill You
55 What Just Happened?
61 Where God Left His Shoes
40 While She Was Out
81 Wrestler, The
xx Yonkers Joe

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Quarantine
Screen Gems (Sony)


6.1

based on 14 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 53 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for bloody violent and disturbing content, terror and language

Starring Jennifer Carpenter, Jay Hernandez, Columbus Short, Greg Germann, Steve Harris, Dania Ramirez, Rade Sherbedgia, and Jonathon Schaech

Television reporter Angela Vidal (Jennifer Carpenter) and her cameraman (Steve Harris) are assigned to spend the night shift with a Los Angeles Fire Station. After a routine 911 call takes them to a small apartment building, they find police officers already on the scene in response to blood curdling screams coming from one of the apartment units. They soon learn that a woman living in the building has been infected by something unknown. After a few of the residents are viciously attacked, they try to escape with the news crew in tow, only to find that the CDC has quarantined the building. Phones, internet, televisions and cell phone access have been cut-off, and officials are not relaying information to those locked inside. When the quarantine is finally lifted, the only evidence of what took place is the news crew’s videotape. (Sony Pictures)

GENRE(S):	Horror \| Mystery \| Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	Paco Plaza (motion picture "Rec") Luis Berdejo (motion picture "Rec"), Jaume Balagueró (motion picture "Rec") Drew Dowdle John Erick Dowdle
DIRECTED BY:	John Erick Dowdle
RELEASE DATE:	Theatrical: October 10, 2008
RUNNING TIME:	89 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

Entertainment Weekly Clark Collis

Quarantine director John Erick Dowdle and co-writing brother Drew wisely stick close to the told-from-the-cameraman's point-of-view template of the terrific original, though they add a few fine flourishes.

TV Guide Jeremy Wheeler

Claustrophobic, jittery at times, and electric in pace, Quarantine is a stripped-down bloody thrill ride that -- while certainly not catering to everyone's tastes -- should satisfy gore-hounds looking to step up their theatrical horror cuisine beyond the usual creepy little kid rehashes.

LA Weekly Jim Ridley

It's a shame that this English-language cover of an excellent Spanish shocker will eclipse the original, at least in U.S. theaters -- but even those who despise remakes will have to admit that director John Erick Dowdle's furious retread is scary as hell.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

Give Quarantine credit: Without resorting to computer-generated monsters or supernatural explanations, it uses consistent logic and confinement to find new ways of being scary.

Film Threat Scott Mendelson

Worth seeing for its solid first two acts, some terrific acting by some favorite character actors, and a several solid spook-show scares.

Empire Simon Crook

As a visceral, camera-shuddery ride into foamy-mouthed zombie hell, it’s efficient enough -- but if you’ve already seen [Rec], steer clear...

The New York Times Jeannette Catsoulis

The template is familiar, but Quarantine delivers the heebie-jeebies with solid acting and perfectly calibrated shocks.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Dowdle manages a few nice shocks and some neat moments of pitch-black gallows humor, but Quarantine nevertheless feels awfully familiar, and it grows less convincing with each passing moment. At its worst, it abandons realism entirely and flirts with gory kitsch.

Los Angeles Times Michael Ordona

Shame as well upon the advance marketing department for blowing the end of the movie in ads, thus exorcising any ghost of a chance Quarantine had of issuing a surprise.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

It's easily the weakest entry into this ever-expanding category and is inferior to its subtitled source material. Quarantine implies "stay away" and that's not bad advice.

The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck

Oh, "Blair Witch," what hath thou wrought? It has taken less than a decade, but the concept of horror films filmed documentary-style has officially become a tiresome cliche.

Variety Joe Leydon

A modestly inventive, sporadically exciting thriller that nonetheless proves too faithful to its central conceit for its own good.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Quarantine is a one-note nightmare, nicely pitched to the high-C howls of the bitten and the biters but offering considerably less froth than last year's "The Signal," which mined similar nightmares with far more fulsome results.

Boston Globe Michael Hardy

Like "Blair Witch," Quarantine uses the conceit of a movie-within-a-movie to give documentary immediacy to its assorted grotesqueries.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.1 (out of 10) based on 53 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Joshua D. gave it a1:
REC. Thats all I have to say. If you didn't like the ending well the Original VASTLY superior Spanish version won't be of any help. The movie was waaaay too bright to be scary. All I have to say is that the original is much much better, and had a reporter who wasn't as annoying as the one in Quarantine.

Tony S. gave it a7:
Overall much better than expected, I dug it plenty. If your a fan of the Blair Witch mock-umentary style stuff you will too.

Andrew R. gave it a10:
This movie has been the best Zombie-based movie I have ever watched. Why? Simple, it includes so many psychological implications that when the zombies finally appear you are already too sucked into the movie that you can feel the frustration and fear the characters are feeling.

Jose B. gave it a0:
Horrile i saw it bootleg but still good enough too tell this is the worst movie ever better off watching beverly hills chihuahua.

Tommy Boy gave it a6:
Dizzy watching another "Blair Witch" hand held camera. However, much better the the fore mentioned. As of 10/23 movie has taken in $25 million...was made for $12 million (where the money went is a mystery) so it's on it's way for a net profit. No name stars so the "payroll" was small. Still...$12 million to make this..???? Another movie with a "sudden" ending leaving everyone pis...d off.

Michelle W. gave it a4:
I saw the movie expecting a great horror film, but it was very much like 28 days later with extremely bad camera work, I got sick watching it, and it made me so mad because the camera was waving around and you couldn't make anything important out, then when she found the room with all the weird info and newspapers in it, it just skimmed over, but I never understood cause I COULDN'T see it clearly for the damn camera work..It also made me mad at the end you kinda remeber the set up her on the floor from the trailor, so you know what is about to happen, in my opinion, it had no ending whatsoever! everyone dies, if everyone dies, atleast show the aftermath or what the gov says or something! it just ends..it had a good foundation but didnt take it anywhere.

Brenda S. gave it a0:
Lamest movie of all motha' fuckin' time!!!!!!!!!!!!!! worst movie ive ever seen in my life. it was freakin' retarded! DONT SPEND UR MONEY ON THIS LAME MOVIE! was not scary at all. was funny only because it was that retarded. totally ruined my excitment for this movie.

Quarantine Screen Gems (Sony)

Quarantine
Screen Gems (Sony)