Movie Night! 'Patient Zero' and 'Legion'

You've probably noticed that my reading hasn't been going too well recently. Well, that's because my reading hasn't been going too well, loads of good intentions but a massive pile of half finished books by my bed. Work demands have been the main reason (hopefully this will calm down soon, please let it calm down soon) and after another tough day yesterday, all I was good for, when I got back to mine, was a couple of movies before bed..

One of the movies I chose was pretty shocking while the other one just ended up being, well... meh. I really need to get my reading groove on again, I can't sit through more films like that, I just can't...

'Patient Zero' (2018)

Humanity is battling intelligent adrenaline fuelled creatures born from a 'super strain' of rabies. After being bitten, human survivor Morgan realises that he is asymptomatic and can communicate with the infected, leading the last survivors on a hunt for Patient Zero and a cure...

Poor Matt Smith isn't having the best of luck with his choice of films 'post Doctor Who', First he finds himself in the risible 'Terminator Genisys' and now he has a starring role in a third rate 'Infected Apocalypse' movie. I'll bet his agent must be scared to show his face right now...

'Patient Zero' looks like a film that's had a few quid sunk into it, it's just a shame that someone somewhere didn't make the same effort with the plot. I say 'plot' but there is no plot really, just a bunch of humans hiding out in an abandoned missile silo and interviewing the infected (who really don't like music, we keep being told because that is the thing that is supposed to make 'Patient Zero' stand out from the rest of the pack, it gets old really quickly, lets just leave it at that).

I liked the twist but that is literally all 'Patient Zero' has going for it (apart from the invasion of the silo but come on, we all knew that was coming; the rest of it is just riffing off other, better, 'infected apocalypse' movies. To be fair, Matt Smith and Stanley Tucci are briliant in their roles; it may be their job to carry the film but there was an awful lot of film that needed carrying here. Just watch ’28 Days Later’ again, it’s a much better film.

'Legion'  (2010)

At a remote desert truck stop, the fate of the world will be decided. God has had enough and has directed his angelic host to tear it all down and start again, the fate of an unborn child could hold the key to everything… Armed and united by the Archangel Michael, a group of strangers become unwitting soldiers on the frontlines of the Apocalypse. Their mission: protect a waitress and her unborn child from the relentless, bloody siege of God’s own army…

So… ‘Assault on Precinct 13’ but with angels…? Kind of but that off the cuff comparison detracts from how dull this film ended up being. It shouldn’t have done, constant gunfights under the cloud of the apocalypse (and with some pretty weird possessed humans) should have been really cool. But it wasn’t. What we get instead is a conveyor belt of ‘baddies’ to shoot with an occasional ‘end of level boss’ to spice things up a little. That would have been cool if it wasn’t so monotonous. As with ‘Patient Zero’, there is very little story to back this up and it shows, it really shows. It also doesn’t help that a lot of the film takes place in near darkness (bloody clouds of flies…) so you can’t really tell what is happening.

Paul Bettany is great as the Archangel Michael, all otherworldly and stuff (he didn’t have to go far to find the inspiration for Vision…), but it’s not enough to make this film any more than just a bog standard shoot em’ up with a couple of decent set pieces. Shame really as ‘Legion’ looked like it had some potential…

Oh well, onto the next movie (whatever that ends up being) and I’m hoping for some better luck in my next choice. Can anyone point me at a decent horror movie or failing that, something with a really cool swordfight? Thanks!