


Cabin Fever: Patient Zero (2014)

  Tags: bacteria, cabin fever, Cabin Fever: Patient Zero, disease, flesh eating virus, Jake Wade Wall, Jillian Murray, Kaare Andrews, Lydia Hearst, Mitch Ryan, paranoia, Ryan Donowho, sequel, The Indomina Group, virus

Your rating: None Average: 6 (11 votes)
Reviewer Rating: 

Rating #: 
Kaare Andrews
91 minutes
Sean Astin, Brando Eaton, Jillian Murray, Lydia Hearst, Ryan Donowho, Mitch Ryan

It seems that a lot has changed from the point that this was announced to now. It was originally going to be a prequel of sorts that would detail the origins of the virus and was going to focus on some sort of cruise ship colliding with an abandoned research vessel where the virus had been unleashed. Somewhere along the way things changed and it seems that none of us following the project were informed. Either way, the final result ended up being surprisingly decent and better than the previous sequel, although that's not exactly saying a whole lot.

The actual story for the film follows a group of 20-something friends on vacation in South America. In celebration of one of'em getting married they decide to go to a small undocumented island for a little fun, but soon discover that the island is also home to a research facility. A facility that just so happens to have an outbreak of the very same virus that had been encountered in the previous films. Only this time they have "patient zero" in their midst--a person who is a carrier, but immune to the effects and whom also may be key to a cure.

Although an improvement over the second film, it still has its large share of faults. Like much of the science facility scenes are incredibly unrealistic, from the look and dialogue to the supposed researchers and scientists themselves. For instance, one particular "scientist" is some skinny blonde with tons of makeup that feels the need to keep most of her lab shirt unbuttoned to reveal an excessive amount of cleavage. I'm sorry, but putting thick oversized glasses on her doesn't make her a scientist. Even the head researcher himself ends up like some sort of silly Bond villain by the end.

I can't say much about our group of leads, as they're just your standard bunch of idiots that you don't necessarily need to care much about. The only character I actually liked was Sean Astin as "patient zero," who was acting the shit out of his role. Someone should've reminded him that he was in a Cabin Fever movie and not with Frodo and his other Hobbit buddies, because nobody else but him seemed to give a crap as far as performance goes.

Negative aside, it kept my interest and I dug the film's slow-mo opening and rewind reveal during the credits at the end. The look and production values also seemed to have improved over the last movie. Many of the gore scenes were surprisingly well done and luckily they're still using only practical effects. There are even a couple potential gag-inducing scenes for some viewers, which is always a plus.

The movie offers a high amount of delicious practical gore effects, seemingly higher production values and a more interesting premise than its predecessor, but runs into a lot of performance and script problems along the way. Regardless, I enjoyed the film to an extent and found it a definite improvement over the previous installment. Fans of the series may find this a refreshing step in the right direction.

Posted on February 11, 2014 - 10:02pm | FrighT MasteR