Project Terrible: The Alpha Incident

If a Tree falls in a boring movie, do I have to listen to it?  Today's film is The Alpha Incident, a back-up film given to me by Maynard Morrisey (of his titular Horror Diary).  I guess I ended up being nicer to him this Round than he was to me, even if it was entirely by accident.  Don't worry- I have the appropriate reprisal headed his way for Round 13.  Just a hint: it may involve gay Vampires.  So what is The Alpha Incident?  It's one of those great examples of how you just kill an interesting concept.  The story involves some sort of alien pathogen getting loose and infecting the residents of a (very) small town.  Sounds interesting.  It sure does!  The movie is not, unfortunately.  It's also worth mentioning that it was Directed by Bill Rebane, the man behind some real stinkers.  Aside from The Giant Spider Invasion, he made The Capture of Bigfoot- a movie so bad that it was featured twice on Project Terrible!  Damn son!  He also made the film Blood Harvest aka That Film Where Tiny Tim May Be Killing People With An Axe.  Do you really want me to review this movie?  Oh, alright.  To see how little actually happens in this movie, read on...

The film contains all of the excitement of two people talking on a train!  Enjoy this action shot!

In all seriousness, this is about some sort of alien microbe being transported via train.  When it leaks, the man must stop and see what to do.  Thrill as he dials!

Thrill as Orville Redenbacher here answers the call!  He says to stay put and let nobody escape!

The only hope for our hero and the people stuck with him rest on this Scientist with a beard that is made of suspiciously-curly hair.  I will leave it to you to infer what it's made of.

One of the men makes a run for it (a second time) and gets hit with a shot from a good 200 yards.  Inconceivable!

 In spite of that, he still runs off.  Doubly inconceivable!

Just to make sure that you can handle the thrill-an-hour tale, they have something freaky happen off-screen.  They could show you, but you just couldn't handle it.

There are good movies that are about people waiting out a disaster/event.  This is not one of them though.

Eventually, something actually happens on-screen.  One of the guys falls over dead (at around 85 minutes) and starts to mutate, proving that he was infected.  The Thing this is not.

Say- I just bought this movie on Blu-Ray.  I could be watching that instead!

Since it was unique to rip-off Night of the Living Dead back in 1978, our hero gets shot to death by the Government (who also poisoned the others), since they have no cure.

Oh good- I hated having hope in humanity.  Thanks.  The End.

Wow, this one sure was something.  Actually- scratch that.  There's almost nothing of note here to really talk about.  As I said in the Intro, I liked the premise.  It's just the execution that is shit.  Nothing of note happens most of the time, which just makes the premise seem all the worse.  A boring idea that becomes a boring film is not a surprise.  A good idea that becomes a boring film is just sad.  I like to think that obscure films like this are going to be hidden gems that I can recommend by saying stuff like 'You haven't seen this- but you should!'  In this case, you don't need to see it.  It's not interesting.  Skip it.  I would have if I had a choice.  Now if you'll excuse me, I have to make fun of people that are different than me and like a show that is inexplicably-popular...

Next up, a controversial Mondo film that was featured on VHS For the Win.  Will the DVD also Win or will they just be a bunch of Brutes?  Stay tuned...