Friday, April 1, 2011

Day of the Dead 2: Contagium (2005)

A group of patients working in the yard at the Ravenside Mental Hospital find a container in the weeds and bring it back to their dorm. Unbeknownst to them, the canister contains a vial from a 1968 military experiment gone wrong which turned people into zombies.

When they open it, strange little pretty objects are released into the air and the next day the group awaken to Elmers glue on their faces and a cough. Seems they have been exposed to a virus which gives them a collective consciousness and slowly turns them into zombies.

One of the group bites a sadistic orderly who becomes infected and becomes a zombie fairly quickly. When he bites others, they immediately change and the whole building becomes a blood bath.

The only exposition comes from Jerry, the son of the military private who stole the vial in 1968. Jerry explains that everyone in the group is dead and that once they start eating flesh, it will make their transformation into zombies quicker. As a punch line, Jerry is promptly eaten.

There are many things that don't make sense. There is supposedly a cure for the virus in the hospital, but after a fight in the drug room, there is no more mention of or looking for the cure. The group who opened the canister have a collective consciousness which sporadically includes the evil orderly but no other zombies. Also Dr. Heller is familiar with the virus but he does not do a good job of protecting himself, and his one phone call does not produce any help for the situation.

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