Name: Infestation

Rated: Rated R

Director: Kyle Rankin

Written by OBS staff member Rose.

Synopsis
An awkward jokester, Cooper (Chris Marquette), is in the process of getting fired by his boss when he hears a deafening ringing noise. He awakens to find himself cocooned in a web and pries off his silky entanglement. The whole office is now covered in webs and after fighting with a gigantic bug, he tries to piece together events and learns that everything has been infested.

Review
Having a slight case of entomophobia (more on the grossed out side than anxious) I was skeptical to watch this movie. However, due to the colossal size of the insects depicted in Infestation, I compared it to watching Starship Troopers, for what really causes me to act out my condition commonly referred to as Covermyisis is seeing bugs at their normal size in large amounts.

Infestation, initially a SyFy movie recently released on DVD, wastes no time in getting to the set up, within five minutes its web city. Although there are some bug beefs, the film doesn’t rely too heavily on constant human versus bug battles throughout simply to gain your attention, it was the journey the characters experience that takes the lead.

Marquette and Nevin have an agreeable chemistry that is amusing to watch. In fact all the actors played their part well, regardless of how much screen time they were afforded.

Advances in character development happens gradually, but steadily over the course of the movie, which is nice to have in this genre; for it is often left out or minimal at best. The special effects are pretty good and make it visually believable and after a while you forget the absurd concept of huge bugs and settle in comfortably and enjoy what it has to offer.  A sadistically twisted addition to the storyline elevates the movie beyond a typical insect horror flick and permits a zombie analogy that is sick, as it is funny. Humorous dialogue makes it akin to the likes of Shaun of the Dead or Severance, by taking a dire situation and poking fun at it in an intelligent comedic manner.

Waiting for a typical ending to this films journey, many of you will do what I did, immediately shake your head and say what??? Did I miss something? You’ll probably rewind the last minute to see if you have. Then you will frantically search The Internets for an explanation because you just couldn’t imagine it ending like that.

Sorry people, but yes it ends like that. I was happy enough with preceding 90 minutes to be pleased enough with this film regardless of its ending.

Rating: 7.5/10 stars

Running Time: 93 minutes