A meteorite crashes into the ocean off the coast of Tampa, Florida. A parasitic organism that was contained in the meteorite infects several fish, of which one is caught & turned into sushi. The sushi is sold to & eaten by Val, the duty manager at the "Castle" nightclub in Tampa. As the night goes on, she becomes infected by the organism, which sprouts a tentacle out of her neck & turns her into a zombie. The zombified Val then prowls the closed nightclub, picking off the workers & turning them into zombies.
Timothy R. Martin is a special effects wizard who worked on such films as the Spider-Man films & (ironically) the prequel of the John Carpenter classic The Thing, which came out shortly before this "effort".
It is obvious that Martin, who wrote the script, directed the film & designed the monster seen here (& appears as the nightclub's DJ), has been heavily influenced by his work on The Thing 2011, But while that film was a reasonable prequel to what is considered as not only John Carpenter's best film but also a sci-fi horror masterpiece & the Citizen Kane of monster movies, Parasitic is nothing but a cheap borefest that utterly fails to entertain in any way (although the creature effects are passable enough, particularly the monster in the end).
It is probably an unwritten rule that most films by visual effects wizards branching out into directing almost always end up as terrible films (the exceptions to this are Stan Winston's Pumpkinhead & Tom Savini's remake of Night of the Living Dead – although I also enjoyed the Strause Brothers' Aliens Vs Predator: Requiem somewhat). In this case, the rule holds true. Martin has failed to observe the cardinal rule of monster films – the monster must support the story, not replace it. Outside of the creature effects, which conveniently allow the lead actress to walk around topless with a rubbery creature on her chest & a phallic tentacle sprouting like a giant zit out of her neck, the film is terrible. The story is simple to the point of crudity, the zombie attacks are predictable & biologically illogical, the acting is non-existent & the film's compact running time is filled with a bunch of idiots having boring conversations about boring topics. You can get a feeling of how low this film is aiming for when you have the opening credits play out over the central character putting her clothes on & the conversation early on which is inaudible but relayed by (purposely) badly-written subtitles that are heavily expletive-ridden in order to give a cheap laugh. It is obvious that Martin needs to forget about making his own stories & concentrate on his day job – providing visual effects, nothing more. What a waste of effort.
Timothy R. Martin is a special effects wizard who worked on such films as the Spider-Man films & (ironically) the prequel of the John Carpenter classic The Thing, which came out shortly before this "effort".
It is obvious that Martin, who wrote the script, directed the film & designed the monster seen here (& appears as the nightclub's DJ), has been heavily influenced by his work on The Thing 2011, But while that film was a reasonable prequel to what is considered as not only John Carpenter's best film but also a sci-fi horror masterpiece & the Citizen Kane of monster movies, Parasitic is nothing but a cheap borefest that utterly fails to entertain in any way (although the creature effects are passable enough, particularly the monster in the end).
It is probably an unwritten rule that most films by visual effects wizards branching out into directing almost always end up as terrible films (the exceptions to this are Stan Winston's Pumpkinhead & Tom Savini's remake of Night of the Living Dead – although I also enjoyed the Strause Brothers' Aliens Vs Predator: Requiem somewhat). In this case, the rule holds true. Martin has failed to observe the cardinal rule of monster films – the monster must support the story, not replace it. Outside of the creature effects, which conveniently allow the lead actress to walk around topless with a rubbery creature on her chest & a phallic tentacle sprouting like a giant zit out of her neck, the film is terrible. The story is simple to the point of crudity, the zombie attacks are predictable & biologically illogical, the acting is non-existent & the film's compact running time is filled with a bunch of idiots having boring conversations about boring topics. You can get a feeling of how low this film is aiming for when you have the opening credits play out over the central character putting her clothes on & the conversation early on which is inaudible but relayed by (purposely) badly-written subtitles that are heavily expletive-ridden in order to give a cheap laugh. It is obvious that Martin needs to forget about making his own stories & concentrate on his day job – providing visual effects, nothing more. What a waste of effort.