Infection: The Invasion Begins

I recently watched Infection: The Invasion Begins (2011) on Tubi. The storyline centers on a small town with a troubled past. A reporter arrives on the anniversary of the latest incident to uncover more about what happened and soon stumbles upon a government coverup and the early signs of a possible outbreak.

Directed by Howard Wexler (Loving Lulu), this film stars Kelly Pendygraft (Good Kids), Lochlyn Munro (Scary Movie), Alice Amter (The Big Bang Theory), and Brian Guest (The Oath).

Unfortunately, the cover art and soundtrack are the only highlights of this movie. It has a made-for-TV feel, with poor writing, acting, and CGI. The concept is weak, and the execution is even worse. There's an awkward subplot with a random old man whom the main character tries to protect, though he comes off as a bit creepy, making it unclear why he's worth saving. It's also oddly amusing to see Lochlyn Munro, who seems to be reprising his role from Scary Movie, but in a serious tone.

In conclusion, Infection: The Invasion Begins is a bad movie and not worth your time. I'd score it a 2/10 and recommend skipping it.

A lot of people have been focused on how terrible this movie is, but there are some bright points. First of all, it's a silly fun plot - just the kind of alien invasion movie you'd expect from no one you'd ever heard of's neighbors who they've never heard of. The acting is terrible, of course, but it's terrible like an old show on the CW, not like a B movie from the 60s. And the CGI is fun terrible. There's a shot at the end where there is fire... that is NOT fire. It's funny, silly background fun and it's on Netflix, so while I wouldn't sing its praises, I would give it props for being exactly what you'd expect it to be.

This movie is about as bad as a movie can get. The script is horrible. the Direction is horrible. The acting is non existent. Kelly Pendygraft, who open playing an old woman cannot act in the slightest. She does the worst stereotype of an old lady you will ever see. Then there is a flashback to 60 years earlier and the story is supposed to unfold. Only you will be sleeping by 0:09:23.

When they cut to the future, the scenes are like cartoons. They actually have bad cgi cars flying! And the reporter drive a SmartCar. Guess they somehow thought it looked futuristic? It doesn't. It looks like a Smart Car.

But back to Kelly. When she's "young" Kelly she works in a diner and looks like she's pushing 40. When she's old Kelly, she's in a home and wears a grey wig. They put some of the worst old people makeup on her, but tell me what freaking age is she supposed to be? 90? 100? It makes no sense.

This really is one of the worst movies ever made. And not in an Ed Wood good way. It's just bad and should never have been made. You cannot imagine how horrible this film is. How slow. Painful is the only word I can use.

Kelly has been in a lot of things in the past 10 years, but mostly shorts and uncredited garbage. She really cannot act so how she got cast, we probably all know.

There a scene late in the movie where young Kelly is wearing a belly shirt, only you're supposed to wear those when you don't have a belly. Who wants to get a gunt ticking out?

Stay away from this movie at all costs. and if you don't, don't come crying to me.

INFECTION: THE INVASION BEGINS is a really, really cheap version of the usual alien takeover storyline in which killer slugs get inside people and proceed to control them. Surprisingly enough, this is quite a well populated genre, with stand-out films like THE DEADLY SPAWN, NIGHT OF THE CREEPS, and latterly SLITHER, all proving to be good examples of that kind of storyline. INFECTION suffers from being much cheaper than those films (well, apart from THE DEADLY SPAWN), but it still provides a few chuckles here and there.

The film's biggest problem lies with the untalented cast members, with only a few familiar faces like Lochlyn Munro propping up their parts. The rest are pretty horrid, it has to be said. Still, the execution is adequate, and there's a fast pace to take your mind off the deficiencies of the plotting. The cheesy CGI effects are about what you'd expect from the genre, and this is at least as fun as one of the better Asylum or SyFy channel movies, so you could do worse.

I honestly can't believe that this managed to get released at all, straight to DVD or otherwise. I think that they spent the entire budget on the cover art for the movie, which could easily fool you into wasting 95 minutes of your life that you can never have back, as it did to me.

There acting is sub-par, the makeup is horrendous, there are huge holes and incongruencies in the story, the character interaction is not believable, strained, and at times nonsensical, and the dialogue is badly written and badly delivered. The real icing on the cake are the effects. I think that I could have done better with a couple of hours and some kind of freeware program.

Watcher beware. If you are a fan of really, really terrible movies, still watch with extreme caution. Everyone else avoid at all costs. F's all around.