Day of the Dead 2: Contagium (2005)
Directed by Ana Clavell
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(Mediocre)
(Not Scary)
Summary
Initially the movie takes us back to 1968 at the Ravenside military facility where a deadly zombie contagium spreads rapidly throughout the staff. But before the outbreak can spread the military surrounds it and kills everyone on sight. One man manages to sneak outside with one of the virus samples hidden in a thermos. He doesn't escape, but when shot the thermos is dropped and left unnoticed.
Now in the present day Ravenside has become a mental hospital and a group of patients find the thermos and bring it inside. Naturally a the thermos is opened and the contagium infects several patients and their doctor. Pretty soon the entire hospital is full of zombies and the security force sent to stop it has been killed. The hospital can't contain the zombies any longer and they spew out into the surrounding neighborhood and start wreaking havoc. Then it ends abruptly leaving the viewer to assume the zombie virus will be a plague infecting the entire world.
Review
This is a sequel in name only! The story take forever to develop into something interesting, and just when it shows some promise it ends abruptly with loose ends and wasted plot lines. The most noteworthy aspect about the film is that everybody (even those who aren't patients at the facility) is a complete idiot. The chief at the hospital, Dr. Heller, is fully aware of the virus and how quickly it can spread, but instead of calling the proper military authorities he just puts the infected ward on lock down and decides to sit next to the bed of a crazed zombie. Some guy from the internet, Jerry, (who turns out to be the son of the guy that got shot trying to escape with the thermos in 68), shows up to brief the recently infected mental patients on the history of the virus. He proclaims how the virus is "very contagious" as he stands there surrounded by obviously sick people who were exposed to it! (Jerry is soon eaten). When the rent-a-cop outfit that supposedly passes for hospital security shows up to quell the unrest, instead of calling the real cops they rush in wearing their white sneakers to get slaughtered.
The acting is very amateur and despite the copious amounts of blood, the special effects are pretty unimpressive. One of the zombies looks like she had a piece of rubber glued stuck to her face. It seems like the lack of decent effects was masked by just having tons of blood splattering everywhere. The story has potential, but overall just doesn't flow. Whether the virus is of alien origin or simply man-made wasn't clear to me, but it did convey some supernatural abilities to the ones that were directly exposed to it as they were connected to each other's feelings and thoughts. Apparently the zombies spawned by being bitten did not share this same ability.
Many of the zombies still retain their full mental capacity, but then others stumble around like you'd expect. Only you can't tell if they are really mindless zombies because most of them were mental patients and maybe that's just how they always were.
The biggest letdown was the final scene - this zombie virus has a cure, locked away in the medicine room. Emma, one of the patients originally exposed to the contagium has become pregnant and full-term in just five days as a result of it. Her doctor and boyfriend, also exposed to the virus, are trying to help her deliver the baby. A nurse happens to read the label on the vial that cures the virus and says it must be injected directly into the medulla within one hour of exposure. Obviously the film is trying to create some suspense here, but the does the fact that exposure occurred 5 days ago not render it useless? The other three patients that were exposed are also present trying to stop them from getting the cure, so Emma's boyfriend, knowing that all of them are "linked", puts a gun in his mouth and kills them all. But apparently this has no effect on the horde of zombies spewing out of the hospital, as a news crew stands five feet away reporting the story and are soon overwhelmed an eaten!
Zombie Traits
| Speed | 
(Human)
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| Intelligence | 
(Human)
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| Strength | 
(Hulk Hogan)
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| Zombie Source | man-made recombinant virus |
The zombies range from normal looking people with some dead skin peeling off to a bloody monstrosity with its organs exposed, so there's really no consistency. They possess super strength - able to punch through doors and lift victims of the ground with one hand.
Best Zombie Kill
Two security guards are standing outside a patient room that appears to be empty. But as one of them puts his face up to the glass for a closer look the window shatters and two bloody hands rip his head completely off, leaving the headless body laying on the floor. The other guard runs away screaming like a Nancy boy.
Best Zombie Death
Marshall is the zombie who's skin has completely disappeared and looks like a bloody pulp. Several of the original zombie patients find him munching on a corpse and in a tussle they proceed to rip off both his arms, then his head.
