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Cooties
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Lions Gate Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Eric Cotenas (23rd December 2015). |
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The Film
 New York writer Clint (The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind's Elijah Wood) has moved back home to Fort Chicken to write his book "Keel Them All" about a possessed boat. He has seemingly even taken a job teaching writing during the summer session at the local elementary school in search of critiques (from fourth graders) but is pleasantly surprised to discover that childhood crush Lucy (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World's Alison Pill) is also teaching there. Unfortunately, he also learns that Lucy's boyfriend is sociopathic gym teacher Wade (The Office's Rainn Wilson). The rest of the teaching staff – uber conservative Rebekkah (Scream Queens's Nasim Pedrad), closeted Tracy (30 Rock's Jack McBrayer), socially awkward Doug (Insidious' Leigh Whannell), stoned crossing guard Rick (Lost's Jorge Garcia), stereotypical Asian janitor Mr. Hatachi (Big Trouble in Little China's Peter Kwong), and Vice Principal Simms (Glee's Ian Brennan) – are a caustic bunch who will soon have to work together when recalled chicken tenders spread a virus that turns their adolescent charges into flesh-eating ghouls who start tearing their way limb from limb through the town's adult population, starting with the faculty and then their parents who come to pick them up at the end of the day. When Clint is scratched but only exhibits symptoms of nausea, science teacher Doug ascertains that the virus only adversely affects pre-pubescent victims; and the teachers must set aside their reservations about hurting or killing those in their care (which turns out to be easier for some than others) in order to survive. Promoted as an "infectious new comedy" from the co-creators of Saw (Whannell) and Glee (Brennan) – as such, it makes sense that the two unaffected children (Grey's Anatomy's Armani Jackson and 2012's Morgan Lily) are social outcasts – Cooties is also a production from star Wood and co-writer (Josh C. Waller) who have also been behind the recent independent genre entries The Boy, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, LFO, and Toad Road. While carnage inflicted upon adults by children is nothing new or transgressive in the horror genre (1980's The Children, 2008's The Children, and the truly disturbing Who Can Kill a Child), gory violence inflicted upon children by other children (mostly diminutive stunt persons on both ends) and by adults is still a cinematic taboo; but its gleeful execution here with plenty of splattery practical effects and an overtone of humor keeps things from becoming grim at its goriest. In fact, one of the weaknesses of the film is its uneven comedy with some improv going on a bit long, comedians Pedrad and McBrayer seemingly left to make their presence known amidst chaotic scenes in which seemingly scripted Wilson, Wood, and Whannell fare much better, and rather unnecessary nods to the better known work of the various cast members: Wilson's The Office cohorts Kate Flannery and Matt Jones have small roles, Wade calling Wood's Clint a hobbit, and Garcia's stoner swallowing his 'shrooms when he thinks the Five-O are coming after him among others (the revelation of McBrayer's gym teacher's name as Tracy may be a 30 Rock reference). Moments of true tension are few and far between because it seems like the filmmakers are reluctant to kill off any of the core characters. The explosive ending remains rather unsatisfying, even when one learns that it was reshot after the loss of a chunk of the budget meant the original ending had to be scrapped and a much smaller-scale, less satisfactory ending was thrown together. According to the Blu-ray release's extras, Wood and Waller conceived as the film as being a more serious horror film, and it was Whannell who saw the comic potential (and brought in Brennan). While the comic potential of a film about infectious, murderous cooties seems obvious, they might have been better off approaching it as a horror film as all of the (sometimes laugh out loud funny) comic elements are not satisfyingly realized so much as thrown in to see what sticks. 
Video
LionsGate's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 2.39:1 widescreen encode is crisp and colorful, from the opening credits macro-photography to the bright close-ups on the schoolyard and in the classroom. The latter half of the film takes place in darker, blue-lit settings in which some noise may be evident (the reshot ending also takes place in a lot of low light environments but seems better handled). 
Audio
The sole audio option is an uncompressed DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that gets a good workout during the suspense scenes (until the score takes over and deliberately overwhelms the sound design), but maintains a suitable schoolyard ambiance in the more placid opening scenes. Optional English, English SDH, and Spanish subtitles are availalble. 
Extras
Extras start off with an Audio commentary by the Cast & Crew: "The Cootieary" consisting of Wood, Wilson, Pill, co-writers Brennan & Whannell, and directors Jonathan Milott & Cary Murnion (with Whannell patched in from Barcelona, Milott from Madrid, and Murnion from New York while the other are in a Los Angeles studio). It's a lively track with quite a bit of joking around (Whannell's method of assuming his American accent is quite funny to hear) in addition to quite a bit of information about the earlier cut of the film that was shown at Sundance (which originally joined together the early classroom scenes with a Steadicam moving through the school, presumably dropped for pacing or because it came across as an arty affectation). The projects origins are rehashed in "Circle, Circle, Dot, Dot. . .Catching Cooties" featurette (13:20) with the additional participation of co-producer/co-writer Waller, Wood discussing the goals of his production company, and Brennan & Whannell discussing their collaboration.  A number of the Deleted/Alternate/Extended Scenes (16:03) give an idea of the earlier cut of the film seen at Sundance. Some of the alternate scenes and extensions are interesting, but they were wisely pruned and reworked for the final cut of the film (demonstrating discipline on behalf of the relative newcomer feature directors). The gag reel (4:03) is less pleasurable than usual because it consists mainly of comedians trying to crack each other up rather than the actors making gaffes. The film's Alternate Ending (4:13; with optional directors' commentary) is not the scrapped original ending, but the one that they threw together with limited resources. It does indeed feel anti-climactic but the filmmakers also dismiss it for its central use of a child zombie character who was seen killed earlier. "Talking Cooties" featurette (9:18) is an utterly superfluous featurette of behind the scenes video of the commentary session with picture-in-picture patching in of remote participants and footage from the film pertinent to the discussion.
Overall
Promoted as an "infectious new comedy" from the co-creators of Saw and Glee, Cooties is a fun diversion but fails to meet the filmmakers' ambitions of an eighties throwback in the spirit of Gremlins or An American Werewolf in London. 
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