Blessed is a 2004 film directed by Simon Fellows, written by Robert Mearns and Jayson Rothwell and is a drama/horror/thriller genre film.

General summary: Heather Graham and James Purefoy play a couple who want to have a baby. She has been diagnosed as infertile, however, and the couple can't afford the medical treatments that might allow her to conceive. She's an elementary school teacher and he's an aspiring writer. The couple are given an opportunity to receive free treatments at a mysterious fertility clinic called Spiritalus. Graham is soon expectant with twins. But as her due date draws nearer, things naturally go wrong, and it appears that she might have become the unwilling carrier for a clone of Satan.

Okay, here's the dilly-o. This move starts out pretty cool. There is some nice cinematography, some cherubic music that adds to an increasing sense of menace, and the always beautiful and near angelic/innocent looking Heather Graham (yeah, even though she was the major slut-whore in Boogie Nights). And the film, a modern take on Rosemary's Baby pops along pretty good, with few problems till about 2/3 of the way in when everything just fizzles. Sure, there are hokey moments, but overall performances were acceptable to that point. You have some logical updates from Rosemary's Baby, such as its not a direct implantation from Satan (ie, Satan does do the nasty directly with Graham. His loss), but instead there is a mixture of modern fertility implantation with Satan's DNA. The DNA was taken (as explained in a poorly inserted expository moment), from an ancient battle between the forces of good and evil, and the blood of the Devil, spilled in the battle, was preserved by monks in a hidden Italian monastery. Why they would do this is not explained. I guess medieval Italian monks are just into that sort of thing. Anyway, this caused the dark ages, blah, blah, blah. But I could deal with all this. It was fun up until that moment. Then, I don't know, somebody started doing drugs, taking bribes, inserting in family members with acting aspirations, your guess is as good as mine. There was the blatantly post-production addition of needless dialogue by unseen characters (Ex. A taxi driver who is heard from his cab saying in his best Tiny Tim voice, "Wow. Thanks lady" and "Okay, you are here." In the latter case, where we 'were' was pretty apparent from previous scenes. No clue as to why this was added as it was obviously from a different sound direction, but whatever). Also, the cinematography went wonky. Suddenly, a pretty nice, straight forward visual style became interlaced with odd angles and pointless 'art shots'. The whole film just went off course. Characters started to overact. The Italian priest who comes to save Graham by killing her babies has the worst accent on film, sounding as if he stepped out of a stereotyped 1940s Hollywood gangster movie and David Hemmings (in his last role) is laughable with twisty pointed eyebrows and glaring looks. Oh, and Stella Stevens of noted breasty booby fame, appears as a real estate agent. Don't pay any attention to her character. She serves no purpose in the film other than to lease the house, smile a lot and talk about how good her crab cakes are. Maybe there is a metaphor I am missing but truly, nothing develops along this line with this individual. Same as the reason for wacking another pregnant lady with a two by four in the middle of the night. There had to be a reason, but it was never made clear. Just film filler I suspect. Bad film filler at that. Too much. But the films biggest flaw is that it doesn't know when to end. When the film should have concluded, it continues on for a good five minutes where we get a look at five years in the future. The twin girls, Satan's daughters, in Angel Halloween costumes, cause a little boy dressed as the Devil, and who is taunting the duo of evil, to choke to death on a grape while Graham looks on in horror. Sad and lame and pointless. Really. Disappointing. And for the record, Satan's daughters, the twins, well, they are ugly little spuds. I guess you could say they were 'as ugly as sin'. Hah.

Overall, the film comes across as modern Rosemary's Baby colliding in a horrid train wreck with the Seventh Sign, End of Days, and concluding with Village of the Damned. I will give this a 1 1/2 only because I think Heather Graham is beyond beautiful and is really cute looking pregnant, though it is all fakery. Let the Devil have this one. I'll stick with original and the associated films.

Quarantine is a 2008 American horror film directed by John Erick Dowdle and starring Jennifer Carpenter, Jay Hernandez, Steve Harris, Rade Šerbedžija,

Watched QUARANTINE last night and found that while still little more than a plague-infested, pre-apocolyptic (suggested) flesh eating gore fest, it was infinitely superior to and far more intense than any 'reality-filmed' attempts of late, most notably PARANORMAL ACTIVITY. Apparently, this is a remake of a Spanish film called REC, in near shot by shot style. This version was definitely an intense film, which builds continuously until the end, when it slows a bit, on purpose, to suck you down into the darkness with the lead actress (Jennifer Carpenter of DEXTER fame and new wife of Michael C. Hall, who portrays Dexter). Carpenter is, perhaps, the weakest point in the film, reduced to screaming and sobbing pretty much the last 30 minutes of the film. However, the intensity of what is going on does over power some of her melodramatics. I would recommend it if you happen to catch it on one of the premium cables or rent it.
Rank:
4 1/2 if you are a horror/people gonna eat you in the dark kind of fan. I would give it 3 1/2 as a filmmaker, and a 2 1/2 if you are not into this genre.