DVD review: “Carriers”
From Friday’s Weekend Look section of The Oklahoman.
“Carriers”
How many pandemics does it take to destroy the world? In Hollywood, apparently one killer virus film deserves another.
With its similarities to the Mad Max movies, “28 Days Later” and “Zombieland,” the long-delayed “Carriers” represents a solid but hardly revolutionary entry in the highly contagious subgenre. After years in quarantine, Paramount gave the film a limited fall theatrical fun and then rushed out the rental DVD this month. The DVD goes on sale Tuesday.
The film follows four companions — hard-bitten Brian (Chris Pine, whose “Star Trek” fame is likely the reason “Carriers” is seeing daylight); his brainy, sensitive brother Danny (Lou Taylor Pucci); Brian’s motherly girlfriend Bobby (Piper Perabo); and formerly rich refugee Kate (Emily VanCamp) — as they travel through the deserted Southwestern United States. A deadly pandemic has ravaged the country, and the quartet has survived by strictly following Brian’s rules, which include regarding the infected as already dead.
The group’s trek to the beach of Brian and Danny’s happy childhood is interrupted when they encounter an SUV on the highway. Frank (Christopher Meloni) has run out of gas while driving his infected daughter (Kiernan Shipka) to an emergency center where doctors are rumored to have a treatment. He confronts the foursome and disables their car, forcing the group to take a tense ride with the frantic father and his sick girl.
While “Carriers” sometimes adheres a bit too closely to genre cliches, writer-director brothers Alex and David Pastor still create many creepy surprises and jolting scares. The thought-provoking horror film focuses not so much on the bloodied infected but on the desperate survivors determined to stay alive at all costs.
— BAM
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