A pair of storage-facility employees discover a former military base beneath their workplace, when a fungal contagion is set loose. Cold Storage is supposed to be a horror comedy, but it doesn’t always rise to a smiling level. It does, however, spew a firehose of profanity and fill the screen with a frequent gush of body fluids, entrails and ripped-open anatomy.
Not long after Skylab crashed to the earth in 1979, one of the space station’s tanks ended up somewhere in the scrublands of Australia. It seems the U.S. government had sent some hazardous organisms into the cosmos for experimentation. But what went up to into the weightless void of space wasn’t what came back down.
Instead, the unlucky inhabitants of a tiny Australian town found themselves infected by a preternaturally aggressive fungus that crept out of that crashed NASA tank and caused their bodies to explode—spreading the fungal contagion to the winds.
Fortunately for the world (though not so great for the residents in that isolated burg), the U.S. military swooped in and expunged the fungus with some white phosphorus bombs. The day was saved.
However …
As the U.S. government is often wont to do, scientists grabbed a sample of the fungus for later study. Just in case. They sent it to a military base in Kansas for cold storage because, well, where else would you keep it? And then they promptly forgot about it.
In fact, the government forgot about that humanity-obliterating substance so thoroughly that when they shut down the military base years later, they left the fungus behind. Yep, they carted out the trash cans and gas masks, but left the deadly contagion in a freezer four stories below ground. You know, where it’ll stay safe.
All these years later, that base has now been converted into a collection of self-storage units. Travis “Teacake” Meacham is pretty grateful for the storage facility, though, since it was one of the only places that would give him a job after his stint in Elsworth prison. If he fulfills his parole requirements, he can finally get himself back on the road to a better life.
Teacake knows nothing about the military substructures beneath his feet. Nor does he have a clue about the fungus sample just four hundred feet down. He just knows that there’s been this odd, beeping sound tonight—sort of like an alarm—that keeps bleating out at regular intervals.
Oh, and the other thing he knows is that the new girl working the night shift with him, Naomi, is kinda cute. She’s also a wild sort who’s willing to break the rules, bust through a sheetrock wall and go hunting for said beeping alarm rather than carry on with her assigned storage-facility duties.
And that’s a real problem for Teacake. He’s always been a pushover for the pretty, wild sorts. They can talk him into doing things he probably shouldn’t. He just can’t say no to someone like Naomi.
Of course, Teacake’s worries are pointless at this juncture. For way down in the military substructure, things are already way out of control. That fungus has broken out of its containment, infecting roaches and rats and spreading at a pretty alarming rate. Soon, more and more living things will be writhing with emerald green glop and exploding in gushing torrents.
Oh, and the government? Yeah, a young servicewoman has noticed a strange alarm that suddenly popped up on her panel.
Does anybody know what this is?
In the midst of this fungal crisis, Teacake and Naomi work pretty well together. They earn each other’s trust and open up about their respective lives. And they support one another, even putting their own lives on the line for the sake of each other and humanity at large.
Retired bioterrorism specialist Robert Quinn, who was part of the original Australian contingent, is called in to help. He’s one of the few people who knows anything about this contagion, and he’s been writing papers and trying to warn military officials about it since the ‘80s. He flies in, and he and his former partner try to deal with the contagion and save the world. (Though if keeping the fungus from spreading requires killing Teacake, Naomi and anyone else involved, they’re fine with that, too. Which isn’t so positive.)
We hear a recorded snippet of a sermon: “He that believes in Me, though he die”—at that point someone flips the playback off. When an elderly woman gets startled, she proclaims, “What in the name of heaven’s glory!”
Teacake argues his belief that zombies are corpses enlivened by magic.
Naomi has an obnoxious ex who she reports is the father of her child. They’re not married.
As Teacake and Naomi grow closer, it appears that they could become romantic and long-term serious.
A small village gets hit with white phosphorus bombs. Another location is imploded by a small, underground nuclear bomb. The underground explosion causes the whole area to sink into a crater, ripping up roadways and almost wrecking a vehicle speeding away.
It’s explained that the fungus overrides its victim’s mind in an effort to spread the corruption to as many living creatures as possible. So we frequently see people, animals and insects explode from the internal pressure, spewing infecting fluids, entrails and brain matter in every direction. (We’re also shown CGI images of the fungus spreading through someone’s internal organs and bodily systems before the fungal growth bursts out in an explosive eruption.) The remaining carcasses are often blown open with bones ripped wide and heads partially blown off. In one instance, a mottled, badly infected man is shot, and his head blows up. But his body sits back up with only the gruesomely mangled lower jaw still connected to the victim’s neck. We also see the desiccated corpses of an entire village of people who were compelled to climb to their roofs before rupturing open.
The fungus slowly eats its way through a scientist’s boot and into her foot. She then vomits inside her hazmat suit before shooting herself in the chest. An elderly widow decides to take her own life on her anniversary, though her plan is thwarted.
Men get shot with pistols and automatic rifles; they fall over, bleeding out. Teacake gets shot in the shoulder as well. Vehicles get riddled with bullets and explode. Several infected animals—a reanimated dead cat with half a face, a lacerated stag, a swirling pack of rats—explode. Someone’s hand gets smashed and broken, leaving it bloody and skinned.
There are a dozen f-words and some 50 s-words mixed in with an overflowing chum bucket of profanity in the movie’s dialogue, including multiple uses each of the words “b–ch,” “h—,” “a–,” “d–n,” “b–tard” and “a–hole.” God’s and Jesus’ names are misused a total of a dozen times. (God’s name gets blended with “d–n” in five of those abuses.)
Teacake’s boss drinks a beer before riding off on his motorbike. Teacake compares people’s compelling urge to store up their belongings to the effects of crack cocaine. Someone smokes cigarettes.
Infected people vomit up gushes of green, fungal sludge that then infects anyone who’s splashed by it. There are some light toilet-humor quips in the dialogue. Naomi’s ex chases her around shouting that he wants to throw up in her mouth.
Teacake says he was talked into doing the foolish things that he was arrested and sent to prison for.
Your eyes do not deceive you.
Cold Storage, this little “horror comedy” pic you’ve never heard of, is kinda packed with recognizable and award-winning talent. Yup, there’s Liam Neeson, Lesley Manville and even Vanessa Redgrave in the cast. And this flick’s script was penned by David Koepp, famed writer of Hollywood blockbuster fare such as Jurassic Park, Mission: Impossible and Spider-Man.
So, does that mean this is a hidden movie gem that will surprise you and blow your fungus-covered socks off?
No.
The fact is, Cold Storage is very much the forgettable B-list flick that you likely thought it was when you watched the trailer. Of the big names I mentioned, Liam Neeson is the only one on-screen long enough to take notice of. And he appears in a typically gravel-voiced role that sits somewhere in a nebulous “Is he trying to be funny, or isn’t he?” void. Really, the whole film feels like a “been there, splashed glop on that” derivative of a number of past goo-spew flicks.
Leads Joe Keery and Georgina Campbell work hard and are both appealing. And there are a couple of entertaining movie moments amid the cinematic slurry. But that’s about all the praise I can smear around. Otherwise, you’re stuck with 90 minutes of a ridiculous premise; a firehose of foul language; scores of exploding, fungus-corroded bodies; and a whole lot of writhing, emerald green muck.
So, yeah, your eyes do not deceive you.
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
