While there are one or two dumber movies around, none does such a thorough job of trashing a talented cast as this high-tech, low-brow thriller, Sam (The Killing Fields) Waterston, in particular, should have been ashamed to collect his check; he seems totally enervated as a Utah county sheriff whose jurisdiction becomes the focus of a biological warfare scare. Kathleen (Twilight Zone—the Movie) Quinlan, Yaphet (Alien) Kotto and Richard (Mask) Dysart seem only slightly more animated. Quinlan plays an inept security guard locked inside a genetic engineering plant when some klutz spills a bit of stuff that turns people into homicidal zombies. Kotto heads an inept government team that comes swooping in to contain the contamination. Dysart is the inept semi-mad scientist who started the whole business. Director Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins are the inept screenwriters who created such dialogue as the line Waterston delivers when a scientist accuses him of being reluctant to enter the contaminated plant: "It's different with you; germs are your job." Everyone is so inept, in fact, it's tempting to root for the bugs. By the end, only one real bit of suspense remains: How does it happen that Quinlan remains healthy when everyone else inside the plant seems to be turning into extras for a Living Dead sequel? Cynics will suggest it's because she is the only name actress in the movie; the explanation in the plot is not nearly so interesting. Robert Wise's 1971 film, The Andromeda Strain, covered the same ground with lots more style and plausibility. But then the people in Hollywood were never ones to let sleeping dogs lie, let alone contagions. (R)
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