Do I rant about my girlfriend's perception that I might tight bummed
nature should end when I am in the confines of our home? Or should I
start my movie review about an Italian-German "Alien" ripoff that tried
more than most foreign knockoffs to be appreciated, "Contamination"?
"Game of Thrones" has not concluded yet, so better keep the peace for the next 48 hours. Here is a review for something that "80's All Over" over reacted to.
A freighter from Columbia was making incredible haste to arrive in New
York. This is quite off since there are no signs of a crew. When it is
tugged into port, Lt. Detective Aris is assigned to investigate the
ghost ship with a team of quarantine experts. He ends up being the only
survivor as the team joins the rest of the crew, exploding after
encountering large green eggs found in Univerx Coffee boxes.
Aris is of course quarantined by the department of defense, but Col.
Stella Holmes believes his experience with these seemingly alien
bacteria pods makes him an asset. He is an asset who is at least aware
that there is only one possible reason why this potential invasion has
come to Earth despite the odds are one in billions. They must have
stowed away with one of the crew members from a Martian expedition.
The surviving member, Com. Ian Hubbard, is up for restoring his
reputation after being smeared by his comrade Hamilton, and will join
these two as they head to South America to stop the cultivating of
Armageddon. Hopefully, this event is just the randomness of the cosmos,
because who can imagine a motive to kick start our destruction?
"Contamination" tried to be more than a straight rip off of Ridley
Scott's classic, and you have to appreciate that. It wanted to be ranked
up their with the memorable Lucio Fulci films like "Zombi 2" and have
the class of Dario Argento. Sadly, the action-free second act prevents
it from adequate amounts of gore to be silly like the prior or provide a
great "Goblin" score like so many of the latter's films have.
This film does not have truly inspired gore, just exploding torsos, but
the first act give you plenty of it and a ridiculous premise that
promised to keep it up. Once the second act starts focusing on
conspiracy of how this could have happened in NYC, it does nothing to
grab your attention like a fun horror flick would. It plays out like a
James Bond film, but Bond films at least have action every 15 minutes or
so. With the film's villains being dependent on the eggs as their only
memes to maim, using them to keep our attention is not as convenient as
rifles or ninjas.
Once Mars is mentioned, you know this film is stretching to justify the
effects in the first act. If this was a third act surprise, my eyeballs
would not have rolled back. With a bit of restructuring, this flick
could have been everything it wanted to be. When you watch a Italian
knock off, you want it to have a plot that lets you see ridiculousness
every 10 minutes. If screenwriter cannot figure a way for an animal to
suddenly strike (dogs at the throat of the handicapped is a reliable
one), than he missed the point to begin with. Because writer/director
Luigi Cozzi knew how to make American cinema jabs in the dialogue, this
being a miss is even more disappointing.
When I booted up Amazon Prime, it was to rewatch "Galaxy of Terror"
since I did not jot down a review after that Netflix DVD. Because of the
gore and "Galaxy's" second unit director and production designer, James
Cameron, eventually directing "Aliens", "Contamination" seemed like it
was going to be a more worthwhile watch. In a way, it was. Cozzi's film
reminded me of how much I enjoy great B-Cinema, and that I am not
necessarily watching it ironically. It felt good to want to revisit
Fulci's films and expand willingness to watch Roger Corman's films that
make you think, "that is surely too much."
"Contamination" is inoffensive and ambitious enough to avoid being
painful, but when your asking for better stories but similar production
qualities, a Euro-junk cinema fan can skip it. In fact, it will remind
you to when the first act ends.
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