ASSIMILATE (2019)

Studio:      Gravitas Ventures
Director:    John Murlowski
Writer:      John Murlowski, Steven Palmer Peterson
Producer:  William Fay, John Murlowski
Stars:     Joel Courtney, Calum Worthy, Andi Matichak, Katherine McNamara, Tonetta Weaver, Kevin Remington, Terry Dale Parks, Mason McNulty, Cam Gigandet

Review Score:

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Summary:

Three teens discover murderous alien clones are secretly replacing their small town’s population.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Hannah leaves a voicemail for her mother regarding a worrisome bite on her arm. A short time later, a screaming doppelganger of Hannah attacks the teen in her home.

Best friends Zach Henderson and Randy Foster record a video tour of Multon, Missouri. While being interviewed, neighbor Mrs. Bissette points out thousands of unidentified insects crawling on vegetation.

Zach and Randy also record Zach’s crush Kayla Shepard playing soccer at their high school. Kayla introduces her father Larry, mother Beth, and little brother Joey.

Zach and Randy go for a walk after having dinner with Zach’s parents. Screaming draws the two boys back to Mrs. Bissette’s house. Zach and Randy find Mrs. Bissette hiding in her closet with a bloody bite on her leg. A small creature breaks through the wall and scurries outside. Zach and Randy follow the creature and see it collected by Pastor Greg, who behaves robotically before being driven away.

Zach and Randy show their strange video to Deputy Josh Haywood. Josh dismisses the footage as a probable prank.

Zach and Randy confront Pastor Greg while he conducts a meeting with other robotic townspeople, including the sheriff. Pastor Greg denies being the person in the video and then bizarrely insults both boys’ families.

Zach and Randy return to Mrs. Bissette. Also behaving robotically, Mrs. Bissette denies being bitten by showing that her leg is fine. Zach and Randy flee after spying a classmate’s father tied to Mrs. Bissette’s bed.

Zach and Randy show their footage to Zach’s parents. Mr. and Mrs. Henderson discourage their son from getting involved in their neighbors’ business.

Kayla comes to Zach and Randy to tell them her father Larry is acting strangely. Zach and Randy tell Kayla about the odd behavior they have witnessed throughout town. Kayla asks for help getting her brother Joey away from Larry. The three teens see additional residents behaving weirdly while walking to Kayla’s house.

Kayla and Randy distract Larry while Zach searches for Kayla’s mother Beth. Zach finds a large pod in the attic. Zach tells Kayla’s brother to hide when he hears Larry coming upstairs.

Zach runs to the bathroom to make it look as though he was only using the toilet. Zach finds Kayla’s mother dead in a basket.

After leaving the house, Zach, Randy, and Kayla take the new footage to Deputy Holloway. Josh goes to the Shepard house to investigate, but reverts to thinking Zach and Randy are creating a hoax when a replacement Beth appears as Kayla’s mother. The three teens realize the escalating danger when they see Pastor Greg in the house alongside Joey.

Thinking they can attract outside help, Zach, Randy, and Kayla try putting their footage online to expose the clone conspiracy. However, they find that their cellular signals are being jammed.

The three teens go to Zach’s parents for help, but discover a clone replaced Zach’s dad. The clones trap Zach and Randy in a barn with two creatures. One of the creatures bites Randy. A doppelganger of Mrs. Henderson emerges from a pod to drain the lifeforce from Zach’s real mother. Zach kills the clone by impaling her with a shovel. Kayla rescues the boys.

Zach, Randy, and Kayla return to Josh once more. Josh shows the teens he killed his clone after it tried to attack him. Josh now believes the danger Zach and Randy tried warning him about.

The group concludes that the creatures bite humans to acquire a genetic pattern and incubate a clone. The doubles then kill the original humans to acquire their memories and identities.

Randy’s clone comes to Josh’s trailer trying to kill Randy. A horde of clones overturns the trailer with everyone inside. The horde pulls Josh away. Randy runs into the woods to draw the doubles to him so Zach and Kayla can escape.

Zach and Kayla walk robotically to blend in with the clones as they make their way to Kayla’s mother’s store in town. While Zach retrieves a van key, Kayla becomes distracted when she sees her brother Joey being brought to a nearby fire station along with the rest of Multon’s children.

Kayla infiltrates a setup where replaced parents have creatures bite their children for cloning. Kayla gets captured when her presence is detected. Joey flees in the commotion. Zach comes to Kayla’s rescue in the van.

After driving away, Zach notices Kayla was bitten. Thousands of tiny bugs form into a creature that bites Zach.

With the entire town transformed, Zach and Kayla formulate a plan to get to the cable company and upload their video there. Along the way, Zach and Kayla encounter Randy’s double and drown him in shallow water.

Zach and Kayla fight past Zach’s double as they infiltrate the cable building. The two teens successfully upload their footage to the internet. Zach and Kayla kiss. The two teens then flee the facility after killing their doppelgangers by activating the carbon dioxide extinguisher system.

Zach and Kayla reunite with Joey. However, they see on TV that the clones have taken over the world. Zach and Kayla realize their town was actually the last to be assimilated, not the first. Scattered survivors begin replying to their online video to organize a resistance.

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Review:

Even though its user reviews are as much of a vitriol pit as any online comments section, IMDb’s aggregate user rating can be a fair indicator of a movie’s probable quality. You just have to know how to recalibrate the ranking.

If an indie horror film with a couple hundred votes averages around 6.0, and those votes aren’t from ballot-stuffing cast and crewmembers, chances are the movie might be well worth your time. Somewhere in the fives can be a good score for a microbudget effort too.

Once a rating dips into the fours, and confidence exists that enough legitimate viewers cancel out automatic haters as well as the filmmaker’s friends and family, it’s safe to say popular opinion agrees the movie is not good. For twos and threes, we can confidently incorporate the word “sucks.”

Again, so much chicanery goes on with people intentionally inflating and deflating these numbers, grains of salt should always season judgment. Personal preferences and current moods naturally affect how someone’s opinion will align with someone else’s rating too. As a loose guideline however, that scale can help turn IMDb’s star system into useful information when deciding what to watch.

Of course, it’s not a foolproof rule of thumb, as evidenced by “Assimilate”. When I saw the movie scored 4.7 based on 382 votes, I frowned with disappointment because the formula implied I was walking into a bona fide bomb. Now watching with diminished expectations, I was struck by surprise over how much I ended up enjoying the film. I had to wonder, was “Assimilate” a target of unfair review bombing or am I merely in a minority of people who can’t see what the supposed problem is?

One justified criticism “Assimilate” can’t get around involves originality. I’d wager any amount of money that you couldn’t find a single review, including this one, that doesn’t mention “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.” Clearly, that’s exactly what “Assimilate” is, just with a teenager twist.

Not much happens in Multon, Missouri. To prove it to their YouTube subscribers, high school buddies Zach and Randy hit the suburban streets of their Podunk hometown, recording daily boredom by interviewing residents and documenting nothingness.

Persistence pays off when the boys walk in on a creature attacking a neighbor and they inadvertently capture the aftermath on camera. Unfortunately, the disinterested deputy assumes the duo’s footage, which includes a pastor moving robotically while collecting the creature, is part of a prank. Bizarre behavior continues all over Multon with no one believing Zach and Randy’s claims until Zach’s crush Kayla notices something off about her father. Now the three teens have to unravel an alien clone conspiracy before doppelgangers come to destroy them too.

Why watch “Assimilate” instead of Kevin McCarthy or Donald Sutherland pointing at pod people for the umpteenth time? For starters, “Assimilate” boasts a fresh-faced cast of up-and-comers who are uniformly strong across the board. Andi Matichak will be familiar as Laurie Strode’s granddaughter in “Halloween” 2018 (review here). Calum Worthy of “American Vandal” and Joel Courtney flank either side, completing a committed triad that makes a familiar plot more appealing through a pinch of youthful personality.

Adult actors also meet their marks. It seems easy to play a stiffly speaking automaton with wide eyes, but Vito Viscuso as Kayla’s dad adds a steely intensity that knocks up his creepiness a notch.

Visual value earns remarkable grades as well. I assume the budget was low although it’s difficult to be certain since so many setpieces play spectacularly. “Assimilate” burns a few blazing fires, crashes a van, and simulates overturning an entire mobile home. Extraordinary mileage comes from the Mississippi shooting location, creating an authentic small town vibe to sell the setting. VOD thrillers almost never look this good. “Assimilate” exhausts every drop of gas in its tank to put together a polished production.

Other than the originality issue, the only complaint I would concede is that pacing could use a kick in the pants. Momentum slows down to light jogs when it should be sprinting, which becomes an intermittent drag on the movie’s energy.

If you can’t get past the obvious aping of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” or choose to dock excessive points as a “ripoff” penalty, then “Assimilate” may make you want to join the negative IMDb voters on principle. Personally, I can’t find any genuinely good reasons to be unnecessarily hard on the film. It’s not going to spawn a franchise. You probably won’t watch it more than once. But “Assimilate” outplays 75% of Syfy’s regular programming. Set expectations to a similar frequency and you’ll find that the film is a fine contemporary remake of “Body Snatchers” that’s highly accessible for young adult audiences.

Review Score: 70

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