Jackson Booth-Millard
I think the most obvious reason I wanted to watch it was because of the good cast list, but I also hoped it would be worthwhile enough, despite low ratings by critics, based on the book by Stephen King, directed by Lawrence Kasdan (Body Heat, The Big Chill, The Accidental Tourist, Wyatt Earp). Basically four childhood friends: Professor Gary "Jonesy" Jones (Damian Lewis), Joe "Beaver" Clarendon (Jason Lee), Pete Moore (Timothy Olyphant) and Dr. Henry "H" Devlin (Thomas Jane) are on an annual hunting trip in Maine. All four of them share telepathic powers, which they acquired as children, after saving mentally handicapped boy Douglas "Duddits" Cavell (Andrew Robb) from bullies and befriending him. Jonesy is able to make the annual trip, despite being a hit by a car six months ago, has a made a mysterious speedy recovery, at the cabin, Jonesy rescues a man named Rick McCarthy (Eric Keenleyside) from the snow, he was lost in the forest. Jonesy and Beaver allow the man to recover, suddenly a herd of animals are seen fleeing outside, followed by two military helicopters that announce the area is quarantined. Jonesy and Beaver return to the cabin to find a trail of blood from the bedroom to the bathroom, Rick is sitting semi-catatonic on the toilet, Rick is thrown from it by a worm-like creature that comes out of his bottom. Beaver attempts to trap the creature under the toilet lid, but it breaks out and kills him, Jonesy tries to escape, but is confronted by a larger alien creature called Mr. Gray, who emits a red-dust and possesses Jonesy's body. Meanwhile, Henry and Pete crash their SUV, to avoid hitting a frostbitten woman from Rick's original hunting party, Henry goes for help while Pete stays with the woman, she also dies and excretes a worm, Pete barely manages to kill it. In Jonesy's body, Mr. Gray tricks and kidnaps Pete, but Jonesy warns Henry telepathically to get away, Henry returns to the cabin to find Beaver dead, and the worm laying a group of alien eggs, to kill all the lavae, he grabs lighter fluid and sets the cabin on fire. Meanwhile an elite military unit, led by the slightly unhinged Colonel Abraham Curtis (Morgan Freeman), specialising in extraterrestrials, are trying to contain the alien exposure, Curtis plans to retire after this operation, and pass command to second in command and his trusted friend Captain Owen Underhill (Tom Sizemore). Curtis and Underhill lead an airstrike into a large forest where the alien spaceship have crash-landed, the aliens using telepathy ask for mercy, but most of the aliens are massacred with mini-guns and missiles, the alien ship self-destructs, destroying the remaining aliens and the two helicopters. Pete is killed by Mr. Gray when he tries to coerce him into cooperating, Jonesy realises the alien possessed his body to gain access to his memories, specifically about Duddits. Henry finds the concentration camp, he realises that all human casualties in quarantine are to be killed, he convinces Underhill to prevent this, going to Curtis and getting himself relieved. Henry and Underhill break out of the camp and head to the home of Duddits (Donnie Wahlberg), who is dying of leukaemia, Duddits informs them that Mr. Gray is headed for the Quabbin Reservoir to seed the water with alien larvae. Realising the danger that the planet is in, Curtis leaves the camp in his armed helicopter and tracks down Henry, Underhill, and Duddits, at the reservoir, he shoots Underhill down, he is mortally wounded and dies shortly afterwards. In the reservoir's pump house, Henry uses Underhill's machine gun to kill Mr. Gray's worm, but he cannot decide if Jonesy is possessed, but Mr. Gray exits his body when confronted by Duddits, who is himself an alien from a different race. Both aliens struggle, finally exploding in a cloud of red-dust which briefly resembles a dreamcatcher, now himself again, Jonesy steps on the final alien larva before it can escape and contaminate the reservoir. Also starring Mikey Holekamp as Young Henry, Reece Thompson as Young Beaver, Giacomo Baessato as Young Jonesy, Joel Palmer as Young Pete, Rosemary Dunsmore as Roberta Cavell and Michael O'Neill as General Matheson. Despite having good talent and names in the cast, and good source material of course, unfortunately what is brought to screen is not very well done, the CGI special effects are very average, and the atmosphere is not very effective, there are memorable moments, but not all for the right reasons, a silly but sort of watchable science-fiction horror. Okay!
