Probably a more mainstream foreign film, but an amazing one nonetheless.
I had sat on this film for as long as I can remember after Baytor suggested it way back when.
One lazy day in work, after watching Unforgiven and Mystery Men, I figured I'd obligate my duty to this thread and review another film properly after my piss poor sleep deprived effort above.
[rec] starts off with a slightly hyperactive tv presenter going over and fluffing her lines for a TV segment she is doing with the firemen in a local station. She seems fairly bored with interviewing most of the firemen for the most part and spends a lot of the time willing something to happen.
When the alarm is raised, she goes on a ridealong to what seems like a fairly normal call for assistance in helping someone from a building, but not an actual fire. What occours from when inside the building is a tense, exciting and pants shittingly scary hour or so of film. The last ten minutes of this film are without doubt some of the creepiest I've seen in my adulthood.
My only criticisms of the film would be the main female character and the point of view shooting. In my opinion she's very irritating and overacts, but I feel this is to give a sense of realism as I'd probably do similar in her position. The POV filming has spawned somewhat from the Blair Witch (which was awful) and lead on to this, which used it well, but irked at times, and Cloverfield and the remake of [rec], Quarantine. I'm not a fan of this as it gives me headaches, but that is just a personal caveat.
All in all, I'd give this several opposing digits up.