Rec 3: Genesis

[REC]3 Genesis
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Paco Plaza
Screenplay by	Luiso Berdejo Paco Plaza
Story by	Luiso Berdejo Paco Plaza David Gallart
Produced by	Julio Fernández
Starring	Leticia Dolera Diego Martín Ismael Martínez Àlex Monner Sr. B Emilio Mencheta
Cinematography	Pablo Rosso
Edited by	David Gallart
Music by	Mikel Salas
Production companies	Canal+ España Filmax International
Distributed by	Filmax international (Spain) Magnolia Pictures (US)
Release date	30 March 2012 (2012-03-30)
Running time	81 minutes[1]
Country	Spain
Language	Spanish
Budget	€5 million[2] US$6.4 million
Box office	$10,148,447[3]

REC 3: Genesis (stylized as [REC]³ Genesis) is a 2012 Spanish horror film directed by Paco Plaza. This film is the third installment of the REC series.^[4] It is a parallel sequel to the first two films taking place before, during and after the films. It was released in theaters in Spain on 30 March 2012.^[5] with more international premiere dates that followed. The world premiere took place in Paris at the Grand Rex on 7 March, followed by midnight screenings at the South By Southwest Film Festival on 9 March. In the U.S., it was released via video on demand on 3 August and was released theatrically on 7 September 2012 in select cities. Sony Entertainment released the DVD on 6 November 2012.

It begins in the series' trademark found footage format but switches to traditional cinematography early on.

The film begins by employing a hand-held style as the main protagonists. Following a photo montage of the couple - Koldo and Clara, are about to celebrate their wedding day. The wedding is primarily filmed by Koldo's cousin, Adrián, and their wedding photographer, Atun, plus footage cuts in from other guests' cell phones and cameras. All goes well and the guests travel to the wedding reception, held in a huge mansion, on chartered buses. Guests mingle as Adrián films his uncle, who says he was bitten by a dog, but claims he will be alright.

With the party in full swing, everyone is on the dance floor in the main ballroom. Outside, Adrián's uncle begins showing unusual symptoms such as vomiting. Adrián also captures people outside, in hazmat suits, searching the area and a police patrol car arriving. Back inside, Adrián's Uncle is sitting on a balcony overlooking the dance floor. Seemingly drunk he falls in full view of everyone. His wife approaches to help him up but he awakens and bites her neck. He stands and then vomits blood on another guest. Suddenly more guests infected with the demonic virus burst onto the dance floor, attacking guests. Amidst the ensuing chaos, Koldo and Clara are separated from each other. Koldo ends up with Adrián, Clara's sister Tita, Atun, and another male guest named Mencu (who earns the nickname Royalties when it’s revealed that he’s in charge of tracking all the songs played for the purpose of royalties) in the mansion's kitchen. Koldo asks Atun why is he still filming and destroys the camera, (From then on the film returns to a normal third-person cinematic view) and Koldo and the group begin to come up with a way to escape. They try the back exits but encounter more infected guests. CCTV footage shows the infected now roaming in the ballroom.

Koldo and the rest discover they fit through the air-conditioning vents, apart from Atun due to his size, and head outside as more infected make their way around the Mansion's courtyard. They discover the police car and go to use the radio. Koldo is attacked by Paloma, the woman the Uncle vomited on, who is now infected. Adrián and the others help him kill her. Royalties tries to use the police car's radio to get help, but is attacked by the infected policeman. The sirens are set off attracting the infected towards them. Adrián, Koldo and Tita find refuge inside a chapel where other survivors have gathered. The survivors reveal infected cannot enter the chapel and that holy water hurts them. Clara's voice then comes over the P.A. system and, knowing Koldo is listening, tells him she is alright and reveals she is pregnant, something she wanted to tell him earlier. Encouraged, Koldo suits up with a knight's armor to find her, telling the other survivors to get the children to the charter buses and escape.

In the mansion, Clara and the priest from the wedding ceremony are hiding in the Central Control room. Suddenly, a horde of infected people begins slamming on the windows trying to break into the room as Clara and the Priest watch in horror. The Priest then claims "it's too soon" and Clara asks what he means by that. The Priest then says he refers to the "Genesis" and talks about the nature of the Demons reciting from the book of Ruth. Clara watches various CCTV shots from around the mansion showing the infected roaming and attacking guests. The Priest then begins to panic but Clara slaps him to calm him down and they escape through the window. Clara enters the room under and finds best man Rafa and Natalie, Clara's friend, but they soon run into more of the infected. On a staircase they encounter the infected Uncle's wife and other infected guests. In the mirror above the staircase, the infected are shown as reflections of Tristana Medeiros. The priest holds them off by freezing them with prayer while the others esape. Meanwhile, Koldo finds the CCTV control room and witnesses the deaths of Adrián and the survivors from the chapel as they are attacked by the incoming infected during an attempt to escape by bus. In the background, a news report regarding the quarantine of an apartment block in central Barcelona is shown, revealing that the events of this film are happening concurrently with the events of the first and second film.

Clara, Rafa and Natalie then find "Sponge John", the children's entertainer, and they try to escape, but Natalie is attacked by one of Clara's infected bridesmaids. Outside, Clara comes face to face with her infected mother. The mother pauses then runs toward Clara to attack her. John shoots her. Clara holds onto her mother's body but Rafa persuades her to leave her as she is dead. With more infected coming, John gets bitten as Rafa and Clara go underground into a tunnel. With the opportunity to leave, Rafa insists they go, but Clara refuses to leave without Koldo. Rafa suggests that if he was alive he would have given some sort of sign.

Inside Koldo surveys the devastated ballroom and ruins of his wedding. He turns up the volume on one of the songs on the dance floor, the song that backed the photo montage, at the start of the film. Clara then grabs a chainsaw and goes to find Koldo as she sees this as a sign. She fights off a horde of infected, but Rafa is bitten in the process by an infected waiter. Clara then proceeds to decapitate him. Clara then runs away from incoming horde of infected. She and Koldo find their way back to each other at last, Koldo spoting her in the tunnel below the kitchen and lowers a ladder. Their reunion is short-lived as a swarm of infected crash into the kitchen. However they all suddenly freeze in place as the priest recites prayers over the P.A. system. Clara and Koldo exit and find more of the infected frozen in place.

As they make their way outside, they are attacked by Koldo's infected grandfather who, being deaf, cannot hear the prayers. Clara is bitten and tells Koldo to cut her arm off before the Infection consumes her. Koldo does so and they leave, seemingly having survived it all. However, when they reach the exit, they discover everything has been quarantined. Clara vomits blood and is ultimately consumed by the infection. Devastated, Koldo picks her up and takes her outside where the police and a GEO team tell him to let her go because she is infected. Clara and Koldo share a final kiss before Clara bites his tongue off and attacks the armed men, who shoot both of them down. In their final moments Clara and Koldo use their last bit of strength to hold each other's hands before dying of their wounds.

• Leticia Dolera as Clara
• Diego Martín as Koldo
• Ismael Martínez as Rafa
• Àlex Monner as Adrián
• Sr. B as Atun
• Emilio Mencheta as Tio Pepe Victor
• Javier Botet as Niña Medeiros
• Mireia Ros as Menchu
• Carla Nieto as Rebeca Viñas
• April jane Aningga as Wendy
• Blai Llopis as Quiquín

The film began with the shooting on 4 April 2011 and ended on 20 May 2011. Post-production began on 23 May 2011. The shooting lasted for seven weeks in Barcelona. A teaser trailer premiered in September, while a theatrical trailer was released in December.

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (July 2012)

The film has received a broad range of reviews, mostly mixed to negative, due to the straying from the original two films' serious overtones.

Metacritic.com gave the film 45 out of 100 with mixed reviews based on 11 critics.^[6]

At the New York Post, writer V. A. Musetto said the film is enjoyable to watch, giving it 4 out of 5 stars^[7]

However, it received a negative review from Slant Magazine's Ed Gonzalez, who said that "if a fourth entry wasn't already in the works, [Rec] 3: Genesis could have easily represented the nail in the franchise's coffin."^[8]

[REC]³ Genesis was released on 30 March 2012 in Spain. It was released on DVD in August 2012. The US release date was 3 August 2012 via On Demand services with a 7 September 2012 theatrical release date that followed. It was released on DVD in the US on 6 November 2012.

A comic book compilation was released in 2012 to accompany the release of REC 3, titled REC: Historias Ineditas. The book presents five different story arcs set in the REC series, illustrated by five different artists.

1. The first, ENCERRADOS (Trapped) explains the fates of the trapped kids from the second film.
2. The second TRISTANA, provides the backstory for Tristana Medeiros, who becomes the possessed after being raped.
3. The Third, ZOOMBII, deals with an infected man making his way to a Zoo, where he infects the animals.
4. The fourth titled EL EXPERIMENTO (The Experiment), follows the priest, Padre Albelda, (the dead priest from the second film and the man heard on the voice recording at the end of the first installment) attempting to end the Medeiros Girl's life in the apartment.
5. The Final Arc follows the Infected Uncle from the third film and reveals what happened to Max (the infected dog from the first film).

A fourth film is planned, titled REC 4: Apocalipsis, with Manuela Velasco reprising her role as Ángela Vidal, the reporter from the first two films. In an interview to Fangoria, Jaume Balagueró stated that the film won't have an apocalyptic style presumed by its title, saying that "all of the movies in the [REC] series have the same budget, so you’re not really going to see big scenes of Barcelona full of zombies; they’re just not intended that way. There has to be a story that’s controlled and strong". The film is set to follow the events of the second film, and will lose the "found-footage" style. Production is scheduled to begin in 2013. At the 2012 Sitges Film Festival, it was announced the film would have its world premiere there in October 2013. An Announcement Trailer was released late November, confirming the return of Ángela Vidal.

However on early May 2013, Balagueró, in an interview, revealed that the film's production had been delayed and the film would now premiere sometime in mid-2014, but did confirm that Ángela Vidal would in fact be starring in the fourth film. A Teaser Poster and updated premise were released early May. Filming began early July of 2013 and the film is set for release October 10, 2014.

• Official website
• [REC]³: Genesis at IMDb
• [REC]³: Genesis at AllMovie
• [REC]³: Genesis at Box Office Mojo
• [REC]³: Genesis at Metacritic