Cooties

Written by Leigh Whannell and Ian Brennan, and directed by Johnathan Milott and Cary Murnion “Cooties” tells the story of Clint (Elijah Wood, “The Lord of the Rings,” Wilfred), a struggling writer who moves from New York back to his small town home to live with his mom, (Kate Flannery, The Office) and takes up a job as a substitute teacher. On his first day he bumps into his old friend Lucy (Alison Pill, “Goon,” The News Room) and everything is going well until he meets her bullyish boyfriend, Wade (Rainn Wilson, The Office, Backstrom), becomes the class joke after a student makes fun of him, and all of the kids in the school try to eat him. Now he must work together with Lucy, Wade and the school’s other wacky teachers if he wants to survive. The film also stars Nasim Pedrad (Saturday Night Live, Mulaney) as Rebekkah and Jack McBrayer (30 Rock, “Wreck-It Ralph”) as Tracy.

“Cooties” is comparable to an effective, edge-of-your-seat amusement park ride that’s inspired by a funhouse. The perfectly cast actors give ensemble performances that not only hit the comedic timing dead on but also give you all sorts of “feels” during the movie’s more serious moments. The writers created a piece of work that is daring, fresh, and – for the 1970’s and 80’s babies out there – is also reminiscent of the “B” horror film formulas (where some awful thing always seemed to be eating people). The writing is successful because even though the film’s child killing content is socially risky the writers have provided the viewers with an uncomfortable, guilt inducing scenario that makes the characters actions completely justifiable while underlining the horrifying theme with really great comedic writing – including jokes written specifically for fans of the film’s cast members. So safe to say the film’s writers easily get away with it.

The directing too is impressive, capturing all the humor and excitement of the film without losing sight of the fact that the plot is still about carnivorous, zombie children, who are hell-bent on eating the adults responsible for their well-being. There are some pretty cool special and visual effects featured in the film as well, and a very necessary shout out to the costume, makeup and design teams. They all did a really excellent job giving the characters neat things to play with, and the audience wonderfully awful things to look at. To sum it up, it is a creative and new horror movie that definitely pays homage to its classic, “B” roots, and as an audience member I would happily see it multiple times.