Quarantine is an English language remake of the Spanish film REC, which was produced with a lower budget but higher box office returns. Both films used a handheld documentary style that was popular at the time among horror films like Cloverfield. Screen Gems, a subsidiary of Sony, distributed Quarantine to capitalize on the success of REC and meet demand for an English version, as REC's subtitles had limited its international success. By remaking and distributing the film, Screen Gems and Sony were able to maximize profits through vertical and horizontal integration.

1. PR2: Same Film, Different Time and Place
Rec and Quarantine Research Task
Quarantine Trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUw2zNR5Dzc
Task 1
Find out the following information:
Rec Quarantine
Director Jaume Balauero and Paco
Plaza.
John Erick Dowdle
Year of Production 2007 2008
Distributor Film Ax Screen Gems
Budget £2 Million $12 Million
Box office takings $32,492,948 $41,319,906
Sequels 2,3 and 4 is to be released 2
Read the interviews with John Erick Dowdle and Jaume Balaguero and answer the following
questions
http://totalscifionline.com/interviews/2761-john-erick-dowdle-quarantined
http://uk.movies.ign.com/articles/865/865683p1.html
Quarantine is an English version of the Spanish movie Rec which was a low budget film
made in 2007. Remakes of films normally occur when the original film is dated. This will
bring in more money for the film company’s because it will extend their fan base.

2. Jaume Balagoro filmed REC in a handheld documentary style to make it more realistic and so the
viewer feels more involved in the film, this style of film has already proven popular
This is not a coincidence, they brought them both out at the same time due to this type of film being
popular at the time so the film companys would make more money from doing this aswell
Because they would gain more money whilst REC was still fresh in peoples minds, they would have
seen the Spanish version , and a lot of people don’t want to read subtitles so they made a English
version.
The directors of REC are two Spanish men, Jaume Balauero and Paco Plaza. The film was released
by FilmAx in August 2007, the film was popular in Spain because it was in that language but not so
popular in England because subtitles were needed, never the less they still made $32,492,948,
which is really good seeing as their budget was only $2 Million. The style of this film is a
hand held documentary, which was filmed by the film crew that was in the movie as they
were doing their own news report
The director of Quarantine is an American called John Erick Dowdle, the film was released by screen
gems in 2008. Quarantine made $41,319,906 at the box office, when the budget for the film
was only $12 million. Like rec the original, this film is also filmed in a hand held documentary
style.
Quarantine was released so soon after REC because Rec was such a big box office hit in Spain that
they wanted to bring the film to America/England, but a lot of people did not want to read subtitles.
So to fix this problem Screen Gems which is a big film company that specialise in remaking horror
films, as they made a remake of Carrie made an English remake to meet the high demand.
Furthermore as Cloverfeild came out at more or less the same time which is another hand held style
of movie, this sort of film was a trend with people at the time which also made REC and Quarantine
so popular. The movie was distributed by Screen Gems who are a subsidiary of Sony. Columbia Tri-
Star are horizontally integrated with Screen Gems, who are also owned by Sony. This means that
even though Screen Gems distributed the movie Sony will still profit from the production,
distribution and exhibition.
Synergy is when a company expands on the fact that they have brought a film out, for example when
a film is released afterwards DVDs, posters, sound tracks, calenders and books are released to
maximize profit for this one film. Vertical integration is when a company has control over both the
production, distribution and exhibition because of this, they receive all of the profits. Sony is a
vertically integrated company, it owns the production and distribution rights to Screen Gems which
made Quarantine, maximizing the profits when this movie was released. Also Screen Gems have
contributed to the overall success of REC by making a English version of the film, people who went to
see Quarantine knew it was a remake, so they would also want to see the original, so would buy it on
DVD, thus adding to Filmax profit