directed by David Pastor and Alex Pastor.
This movie somehow slipped beneath my radar. I only just caught it on NetFlix. How can this be? It's a great example of behavior during an end of the world event; in this case, a world ravaged by disease. We join the story after the initial catastrophe and follow four characters during the aftermath. What we witness is a good reason why you should focus on the basics before the poop hits the fan.
Why survive?
When you could meet your demise each day, you stop thinking about the long term. Merely surviving becomes the goal rather than a means to achieve one. You don't want to make it to the promised land only to look around and ask, "What do I do now?" Why do you want to survive?
A survival goal is intensely personal. It could be a desire to make the world a better place for all or just for your children, or even to find a peaceful home where you can indulge in your love for books. Only you can pass judgement on your goal. Is it something for which you're willing to struggle mightily over a potentially lengthy period of time?
What are you willing do or not do?
This is the end of the world. You're going to be in situations completely unlike those you faced before. You're not going to resolve issues by email or scheduling a meeting. Violence may very well be on the agenda. What are you going to do?
As with goals, what means you find acceptable is a personal decision. I'm not going to tell you that you should be able to kill another human being or abandon people that could negatively impact your chances of survival. What I'm telling you is to decide what's on the table ahead of time.
You don't want to make these decisions in a critical situation. If killing another human being is off the table, that's OK. The ability to act immediately in a critical situation based on this prior understanding could be enough to save your life.
Find like-minded companions
These are personal decisions, but they should be discussed openly among your party. Everyone should be roughly on the same page. Radically divergent goals and acceptable means will lead either to the break up of the party or disaster in an encounter with hostiles.
How not to do it.
SPOILER ALERT!
The party we follow in Carriers got it all wrong:
- They had their rules about interacting with the infected, but one would not abide by them. The rules were so strict that when she herself became infected, she hid that fact.
- Their rules dictated that they kick out infected members. Seems logical, but not so easy to implement when it gets down to it.
- The party had a goal, but in the end it seemed hardly worth the price the remaining members had paid.
This is a must see. The heartrending decisions are just the kind of thing you need to consider while you're not under pressure to do so.