My Cultural Diet

Joe Keery tries to bring some of the same “guy who’s in way over his head” charm that made Steve Harrington so beloved in Stranger Things to this horror comedy, with little success. Which is not Keery’s fault, but rather, the fault of a movie that plateaus within its first ten minutes and does next-to-nothing with its premise. Keery stars as a slacker working at a former military storage facility whose graveyard shift is interrupted by the outbreak of a mutated fungus that the military somehow forgot about. Y’know, the kind of mutated fungus that takes over people’s brains and makes their bodies explode. That alone should make for some fun late night popcorn viewing, but Cold Storage’s aimless plot contains nary a laugh or chuckle. (Liam Neeson also stars in what’s basically a glorified cameo as a government agent called in to deal with the mess, and Vanessa Redgrave shows up randomly as a suicidal widow that the movie largely forgets about.) As for the gore, a good splatter comedy (e.g., Evil Dead 2) knows how to use the ickiness for twisted slapstick and campy laughs, but Cold Storage doesn’t even deliver there. Sure, it’s filled with exploding bodies (both human and animal) galore, but the obviously CGI vomit, entrails, and ichor lack both visual and visceral impact.

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