Carriers

Second this is NOT a zombie film. So don't be fooled by the idiotic marketing of this fine little gem. What this is, is a deliberately paced drama about a group of survivors in a world plagued with a virus that's pretty much killed everyone and the hard decisions they have to make on their way. It could be a companion piece to The Road almost, a sort of prequel set a few years before.

While it is "slow" it only clocks in about 84 minutes which is far too short in my opinion and I wanted more really. Something tells me that the film was originally much longer but cut down by the producers to please the teens who all seem to hate it anyway.

Good film, crap marketing.

The movie revolves around the fate of 4 unpleasant millennials mid-way through an apocalypse caused by a gruesome virus. They've instituted rules that are meant to keep them from getting infected. Some of these seem rational, like "disinfect stuff touched by decaying people."

Too bad they didn't include rules like "let's avoid acting like the cast of Jackass." I don't want to spoil their clever pranks, so I'll compare them to the geniuses who tried to drive blindfolded using only the GPS, like Sandra Bullock in Birdbox.

There are predictable lessons about karma, a few mild jump scares, and plenty of times to take bathroom breaks.

I just left the screening of "Carriers". It was the opening Movie on this years Fantasy Film Fest. At least here in Munich. Well, my first reaction to this film was something like "Wow... this where long 90 Minutes". Most of the other crowd thought the same and their comments where quite similar to mine. Meaning: Good, but a bit slow.

This Movie needs a little tightening to speed it up a little bit. It does a lot of things right! The characters are worked out properly, the camera-work is top notch and the acting is very good. But sometimes there are scenes, that last too long. You know where the Directors want to go, you know how the scene will play out in the end, but it still goes on and on and on... So again: a little trimming would do the film good!

Well, and then there is this whole "Wrong Marketing"-Thing. At least here in Germany they try to sell this movie as a Horror-Movie. That's just wrong. Sure, there are the classic Horror-Elements, but overall "Carriers" is a strong, heavy Drama. There is virtually NO Action and even less gore in it. Instead there are long dialogs, dramatic events and more dialogs. That's fine with me, but it makes the movie hard to find it's audience. The GoreHounds will be disappointed by the lack of blood and guts and the Drama-Fans will be pushed away by the apocalyptic Elements...

So. Once again: "Carriers" has great potential but is a little bit to slow and to heavy on the drama to pass as a great movie.

While the premise of this movie is very relevant to the current state of the world, (Covid-19)the actions by the major players is at best lame and often reaches the point of stupid. An extremely deadly virus has been unleashed on the world and it is almost universally fatal. Two young men and two young women are in a car traveling to a seaside resort where the two boys spent a considerable amount of time in their youth. It takes a bit of time before these facts are clear to the viewer. The four of them have masks and a lot of bleach and are very cautious about contact with anything that could possible be contagious. At first, they seem very knowledgeable about their situation and what they need to do to survive. The two men are brothers, but the exact situation regarding the two women is unclear. It does not take long before the intelligence declines and the stupidity rises. When their car is irretrievably broken, the older brother (the leader) takes out his pistol and does some target practice on a political campaign sign. No one with any real sense of their situation would have wasted precious ammunition like that. Some of their actions appear incredibly foolish once it becomes clear just how deadly the virus is. They arrive at a Center for Disease Control base only to find little more than death and a sense of futility. Almost no one is left alive. Yet, they engage in absurd behaviors where they could suffer broken bones or be in an auto accident. As disaster movies based on a virulence go, this one had a lot of potential, but it is hard to take a movie based on such actions in response seriously.

To all intents and purposes, Carriers really isn't that much of a horror film, it's more a survivalist, character based, road movie. After an infectious virus has decimated the Earth, two brothers (Chris Pine/Lou Taylor Pucci) and their two lady companions (Piper Perabo/Emily VanCamp) are heading to Turtle Beach in the hope that in isolation there they can ride out the epidemic and start afresh.

What follows is that they encounter a man on the road with his sick daughter, and their plans then go astray. The moral dilemmas build up, the character dynamics unfurling in a whirl of human emotions, disappointments and heart aching decisions are evident as the search for sanity and gasoline goes on. Naturally the virus isn't the only thing to be fearful of, there's the other virus, that of the human condition in survival situations...

Having sat on the shelf for three years, Carriers came a bit late in the day to make a telling mark in a sub-genre of horror that has tapped into our new age fear of the virus. In a way that is a shame, because David and Alex Pastor's (writers/directors) film is very well made. With good performances, astute photography and a humanistic narrative that is not without merit. Yet even for 2009 it feels old hat, like a lukewarm sci-fi schlocker without the monsters or apocalyptic peril.

It's well worth a watch because there is nothing irritating here, but anyone expecting some infected/zombie infused apocalypto will be very disappointed. 6/10