Pandemic is poorly named and an even worse film
Stay at home orders and quarantines have popularized two things: online streaming and pandemic themed films, the best of which is Contagion. Another film, titled, Pandemic, is free with an Amazon Prime membership, here are my thoughts on the film.
Pandemic opens with Lauren Chase (Rachel Nichols), a New York doctor now in Los Angeles in the fallout of a major pandemic crisis. After quickly seeing the five phases of the illness, she joins a military team to lead the extraction of healthy survivors.
Pandemic (2016) is more zombie than pandemic themed
The team is quickly ambushed by the mob with Gunner (Mikhi Phifer) opening fire to get their school bus transport away safely, with Gunner narrowly escaping. Gunner bullies the group into changing their mission, searching for another team and his missing wife.
The violence gets more deadly with more attacks, characters not surviving and Chase ultimately forced to confess that she’s a fraud: her real name is Rebecca and she’s looking for her daughter, Meghan.
Unlike Contagion, Pandemic drifts quickly away from science, flu-like symptoms and into a science fiction theme, like the zombie apocalyptic films 28 Days Later or Resident Evil films, all of which are far superior to this project.
There is very little believable about allowing a bus of four people venture into the urban sprawl of unbridled chaos on a blind rescue mission.
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The initial team explains to Chase that they haven’t eaten in days?
Chase offhandedly mentions she was a CDC lab tech, which somehow qualified here to lead the team?
Gunner is an insubordinate, violent jerk, endangering the team repeatedly. Wheeler refuses to help the team during an ambush, “I ain’t riskin’ s**t,” but in a subsequent sequence, he’s with them to find food in a school (which is somehow not spoiled or rotten).
The film is shot in first-person POV, like a video game and riddled with gamer clichés. Gunner is the military protector shooting people and Wheeler is the driver of the bus.
Yes, it’s that on-point.
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Most of the film centers around dark, chaotic sequences of attacks, which get hard to follow due to the lack of lighting.
The dialogue is overly simplistic. For motivation Chase says she’s seeking “A second chance” – not even redemption, that’s how weak the writing get at times.
Pandemic is a horrible name for this film. It’s a Resident Evil knockoff, too violent and full of profanity to land on the SyFy network and unworthy of the cash needed to get it in front of horror fans.
Pandemic airs for free on Prime currently, check it out for yourself.
Pandemic earns 3 stars out of 10 stars
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