[Rec] introduces us to Angela Vidal (Manuela Velasco), the host of a show called While You're Asleep, which focuses on activities which occur overnight. She has come to a fire station with her cameraman, Pablo (Pablo Rosso), to document what the firemen do during the wee hours of the morning. She gets a tour of the station and meets Manu (Ferran Terraza) and Alex (David Vert), two firemen whom she'll be shadowing should an emergency occur. Sure enough, the alarm sounds and Angela and Pablo are on a fire truck, en-route to an apartment building where screams have been heard. The group arrives at the building, were Angela and Pablo follow Alex and Manu inside. There, they find two policemen and several frightened tenants. The seemingly benign case with an old woman locked in her apartment suddenly becomes a nightmare scenario. Some of the buildings inhabitants have seemingly gone mad and begin attacking others, while the authorities on the outside seal off the building, letting no one leave. As they attempt to survive the ordeal, Angela orders Pablo to record everything.

So, the question here is, "Why did anyone feel that it was necessary to remake [Rec]?" Other than the fact that Hollywood is convinced that Americans won't see a foreign language film, I don't know. There's not a great deal of important dialogue in [Rec], save for the finale. Most of the film is so fast-paced, the words take a backseat to the action. Comparing the two films, [Rec] is better than Quarantine due in no small part to the fact that it's fast and lean. The movie sans end credits only runs about 72 minutes, but that brief period is packed with enough scares for at least three movies. By comparison, Quarantine is over fifteen minutes longer and it adds superfluous characters and situations which aren't in the original.

If you're bored with today's horror movies, do yourself a favor and check out [Rec]. It will leave you breathless, and if you're like my wife, the finale will make you want to sleep with the lights on. If you liked Quarantine, you owe it to yourself to see what the film could have been...or in fact was at one point.

[Rec] bites your face off on DVD courtesy of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. The film has been letterboxed at 1.85:1 and the transfer is enhanced for 16 x 9 TVs. As with any film in this genre, the image quality is a judgment call. The image is very sharp and clear in static shots, and in the opening scenes in the fire station, the colors look very good. However, once the action starts, the picture is often blurry and somewhat dark. Of course, this is part of the allure of the film. Intentional flaws aside, this transfer looks great. The DVD carries a Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track which provides clear dialogue and sound effects. Throughout the entire film, the stereo and subwoofer effects are fantastic. Every scream and yell comes through crystal clear. However, the surround effects are somewhat weak until the finale. Was this intentional? No matter, during the last few minutes, the surround sound really kicks in and makes a scary ending every more frightening.

The [Rec] DVD contains only one extra. "[Rec]: Making Of" (18 minutes) gives us a thorough overview of the film's production. Balaguero and Plaza talk about the origin of the idea and why they chose to go in this direction. We learn about the 20-day shooting schedule and see how the actors often didn't know what was going to happen next. There is also a look at the special effects makeup.

UPDATE:

On September 25, 2018 Shout! Factory released [Rec] on Blu-ray Disc.  The film has been letterboxed at 1.85:1 and the Disc contains an AVC 1080p HD transfer which runs at an average of 30 Mbps.  The image is very sharp and clear, showing no overt grain and no defects from the source materials, save for those which are intentional.  The picture is notably sharper and not as dark as the DVD version.  The picture takes on a hyper-realistic look here, offering a nice crispness and emphasis on detail.  The colors look very good and, although some scenes are very dark, the image is never overly dark.  The dark scenes show very nice contrast.  The Disc carries a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track which runs at 48 kHz and an average of 4.0 Mbps.  The track provides clear dialogue and sound effects.  The surround sound effects are very impressive and nearly constant.  These effects are detailed and highlight sounds coming from all over the building.  The subwoofer is also impressive, most notably when the helicopter passes by outside -- in fact, the throbbing helicopter effects are so deep, they border on being annoying.