‘Cold Storage’ offers up a lighthearted infection horror comedy that never quite heats up or succeeds on the gross-out factor.
Stephen King once said, “If I find I cannot horrify, I’ll go for the gross-out. I’m not proud”. He recognizes splatter as the lowest form of terror…albeit one that’s still plenty entertaining, when done well. Director Johnny Campbell’sCold Storage aims no higher than that bottom of the barrel bar. His contagion horror comedy pulls from the disgusting likes of Planet Terror. It wishes to provide giddy nastiness like Feast. To burst as many bodies as Contamination. Yet it hardly earns a slight gag, failing to meet the bare minimum and rendering it neither gross, nor scary, nor even all that entertaining.
Opening text describes a space station containing an experimental fungus that fell out of orbit in 1979, crash-landing somewhere in Western Australia. Following a deadly encounter with the mutated fungi, the government placed the last remaining sample in a secure bunker. Eighteen years later, the facility has since become Atchison Self Storage, where a miserable Travis (Joe Keery) works. During new co-worker Naomi’s (Georgina Campbell) first shift, the two discover a strange beeping. One torn-down wall later, they happen upon the lab where the fungus has been kept. Only, thanks to Global Warming and unpredictable temperatures, the deadly bacteria has managed to thrive. Now, the pair must work together to escape a horde of infected humans and animals alike before the fungus escapes and consumes the world.
Included in the cast is Liam Neeson as Major Robert Quinn, now semi-retired. He was there during the thrilling cold open in which the government first discovers the fungus. You’ll wish he was present for the rest of the film, because Cold Storage is at its best when he’s on screen. Having starred in everything from Darkman to Taken to the recent Naked Gun reboot, he’s an actor who understands how to play humor straight. His gravelly delivery fits the exhausted guy who tried to warn everyone and wasn’t listened to character to a T. That allows lines like, “we are at pucker-factor ten,” to land as intended. If only he spent more time amidst the action where he thrives, rather than being relegated to the outside diplomacy of the situation for most of the runtime.
Both Campbell and Keery are talented actors with a slew of memorable performances to their names. For a time, that shows, as Naomi’s childish giddiness for adventure overpowers the worried resignation of Travis. But what starts as a cute relationship withers and dies on the vine thanks to the performers practically sleepwalking through the roles. They’re not the only ones, either. Outside of Neeson, the entire cast has a difficult time standing out. David Koepp’s script doesn’t do them any favors by overstuffing the narrative with odd subplots, such as a biker gang that arrives to steal TVs (?). Between bland dialogue and sparse character building, the players of Cold Storage mostly come across as nothing more than dull host bodies for the fungus.
The performances are merely the symptom of a greater issue, though. Despite rivers of blood and slime, Cold Storage has an energy problem. Jonny Campbell struggles mightily to imbue any sense of atmosphere, tension, or excitement. That’s especially frustrating, because the cold open delivers all of that amidst the eerie, dust-swept Australian town where the fungus is found. Yet the filmmaker never manages to recapture that terror of discovering decrepit bodies all lying on roofs like a scene out of Tremors. Composer Mathieu Lamboley’s quirky sci-fi score goes underutilized. The frantic camerawork of the first scene by cinematographer Tony Slater Ling rarely makes itself known. It’s almost as if the first ten minutes and the rest of the film are cut from different movies.
Look, Cold Storage doesn’t need to be “scary”. Nor does it intend to. But if the aim is to have audiences reaching for the barf bag, then the film misses that mark by a mile, as well. A disappointment, too, considering that Koepp’s script is packed with fungal zombie gruesomeness. Countless bodies explode into a rain of guts and goop. Infected zombies vomit splashes of green slime. Everywhere you look, the fungus festers. It should all be disgusting. Except, the vast majority of it is executed with CG, neutering its effectiveness. Digital goo doesn’t drip, drip, drip the way physical slime does. It doesn’t have that necessary consistency. When I watch a film like this, I want to feel that goop coating my skin. It should make me want to take a shower. Instead, the effects here come off as lazy and without any weight.
Less clean-up on set, I suppose.
Cold Storage simply does not commit to the premise. On one hand, it takes itself much too seriously to lean into the humor. As if the filmmakers are afraid to be “too silly” with a movie that features infected deer vomiting green at the camera. Go big or go home, I say. On the other hand, the film doesn’t take itself seriously enough. Actors hardly ever react to moments of horror with anything resembling true terror. Ultimately, the film isn’t scary. It isn’t gross. And it isn’t even all that funny. It just kind of exists, bobbing at sea with nowhere satisfying to go.
Campbell’s film isn’t without its charm, thanks to splashes of good humor and a solid concept. Despite that, Cold Storage never manages to heat up into anything entertaining enough to even reach that low bar described by King. There are too many bursting bodies, too many explosions of guts and goo, too good a cast for the film to illicit this heavy a shoulder shrug. If not for Neeson, Campbell, and Kerry, I might’ve touched that fungus myself, just for a little excitement. This may work for those seeking lighthearted, entry-level gross-out horror that plays it safe. Otherwise, go ahead and keep Cold Storage on ice.
Cold Storage infects theaters on February 13th via Samuel Goldwyn Films and Studio Canal.
