Infected

For years I've been watching late night trash on the Sky3 channel in the UK, which seems to show the kind of films that the Sci-Fi Channel makes. 99% of what I see there is absolutely awful, but occasionally something decent will come along to enliven things (MANEATER and the so-trashy-it's-great AZTEC REX are two that spring to mind). Over the years, I've been less than impressed with the low budget alien siege movies, of which INFECTED is one, but I was delighted to find that this is far better than the usual fare.

Things kick off in high gear with the kind of intense conspiracy stuff you'd see in one of the early X-FILES episodes. From there we accelerate into the kind of aliens-are-already-here-and-in-disguise schtick that allows producers to bypass special effects in favour of human adversaries. Eventually, it devolves into the usual kind of nonsense with the heroes being hunted by their extraterrestrial foes while various people are shot/blown up/kidnapped en route. The film focuses on gruesome effects shots of alien maggots emerging from their human hosts, while saving up a highly cheesy CGI shot for late on in the proceedings (let's just say I was reminded of the '50s B-movies of old.

Surprisingly, the casting isn't too bad for this outing, with both Gil Bellows and Maxim Roy proving able leads with more talent than most. While the villains are pretty weak and unimposing, a couple of "name" actors are reserved for kooky cameo roles (Judd Nelson and Isabella Rossellini) which ups the ante a little. Hardly a great movie, but if you're a purveyor of this kind of crap you won't be complaining as this is a cut above the rest.

Adam Weissman, a director primarily known for kid shows gives us this Syfy original about Ben and Lisa, a duo of newspaper reporters who undercover a massive government conspiracy for an alien invasion.

X-files this definitely is not for one it has the worst CGI 'effects' since.... well the last Made-for- Syfy flick that i've seen. The plot is a bland carbon copy cut & paste job of about a million other films and I didn't give a toss about if our 'heroes' could save the day or not, it was just an ultra- lame attempt at movie making and could barely pass for entertainment much less as watchable.

My Grade: D-

DVD Extras: A trailer for "Backwoods" is all you get for extras

In Boston, there is an unknown epidemic and the population is consuming the Hydropure water and vegetables from Whitefield Corporation. The City Hall Secretary Taylor Lambert (Neil Napier) contacts the newspaper journalist Lisa Wallace (Maxim Roy) expecting to give evidences of a conspiracy that his partner Connie (Glenda Braganza) is collecting in the plant of Whitefield. However, Glenda is captured and murdered by the guards, and Lambert shots the Mayor and takes a sample of his blood to give to Lisa. Lambert is hunted and wounded by the police and he meets the third class journalist Ben Mosher (Gil Bellows) that writes the sensationalist column Mystery Science in the same newspaper. He gives a vial with he Major's blood to Ben before he dies and Ben gives the sample to his friend Knutt Jourgensen (Jesse Todd) for analysis. Sooner Ben and Lisa disclose an alien conspiracy to breed using the Earthling bodies as hosts and nourishment for their offspring.

"Infected" is another sub product of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", "X-Files" and "V", but is also entertaining considering that it is a TV movie and not so bad for fans like me of B-movies. The screenplay has many plot holes and a bizarre beginning without much explanation. For example, Connie breaks in the dangerous plant of the aliens to collect evidences alone. Or Lambert unnecessarily shots the Major to collect his blood. Or the lack of explanation how the aliens reached the important positions in the Bostonian society, like Mayor, editor of a newspaper or supplier of water, food and vaccine for the whole population in a country that has governmental agency like the Food and Drug Administration, responsible for protecting and promoting public health through supervision of the products supplied by Whitefield Corporation. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Infectados" ("Infected")

This movie is not a great movie by any standard.

It is also not a terrible movie, there are some bad parts, aliens are fast sometimes and slow other times being a prime example but it kept me entertained. I knew what I was getting into, and it was not bad for what it was.

I was entertained and it kept me on board for its entire runtime. Unlike some other reviewers, I liked that it through us into the thick of things.

If there was absolutely nothing else on, I wouldn't mind watching it again.

Campy goofy sci-fi 'conspiracy' story with actors having a good time, aware of what kind of movie they're in. The extras who were coughing and acting sick were a hoot, and matched the style of this low-budget feature. No doubt direct from the SyFy hack machine.

But hey -- campy goofy PulpFilx can be fun! It's better then most junk going through the air waves these days.

Loved seeing Rossellini. So for just pure pizza fun pop this sci-fi movie and vegg. Good score and decent directing in an old story of aliens trying to breed among us earhlings.

Enjoy!