Let's say Elijah Wood starts a company to make horror movies called Spectre Vision and one of the writers John C. Waller asks why hasn't there been a movie about killer kids called Cooties? Then add Glee's Ian Brennan and Saw's Leigh Whannell to write the script along with a huge comedy cast ensemble and two brand new directors to feature films. We get a very dark horror comedy with some messed up deaths and hilarious dialogue!

Cooties_2Struggling writer Clint moves back to his home town of Fort Chicken, most famous for its chicken nuggets, to be a substitute teacher at his old middle school while he works on his magnum opus about an evil boat. Unbeknownst to him an epidemic is about to break loose due to horrible conditions at the chicken nugget plant that contaminated the food being fed to his students! Meeting his fellow faculty he reconnects with a girl he used to know by the name of Lucy, who know teaches fourth grade. Unfortunately for Clint she is dating the big shot Physical Education teacher Wade, who constantly calls out Clint on any BS in his writings as well as acts like an all around jackass at times. Everything goes to hell when one of Clint's more aggressive students begins mocking a girl infected with the virus and he is bitten by her. The plague begins to spread around the school as the kids turn into tiny flesh eating terrors and the faculty must use all their talents and knowledge to fight them off!

259Perfect flick for anyone afraid of kids and even better film for anyone who has ever had to teach miscreant kids. They really play up the generational gap as these kids try to get away with anything and everything by lying about something the teachers might have done as well as their inability to respect their elders. You see which kids are going to turn into little monsters from a mile away and you gladly welcome it in hopes that the teachers decapitate them! The worst kids get the nastiest zombiefied looks and are just utterly brutal when taking out other people. They do not skimp away from the gore or taboo in this flick as one of the kids is picked up from school by his mom and jumps in the back seat eating his baby brother. Kids tearing principals to pieces ring around the Rosie style, biting each other's faces off. This film is relentlessly brutal but the ensemble cast of comedians lightens the mood and makes it an easier pill to swallow.

960Elijah Wood plays Clint who even through everything is still trying to write his book about an evil boat. Raine Wilson plays the huge jackass jock in the film that is Clint's mortal enemy but probably has the best story arc in the film and most redeeming one. Just putting it out there this is the most badass Raine Wilson will ever be armed with a baseball shooting gun to knock out the terror tykes! We also have Allison Pill as Lucy who is described as an aggressive optimist and by that she literally says she combated the terrorists after 9/11 with a positive attitude, which often times makes her the level headed one trying to solve the problem. Personally and not surprisingly the stand out character goes to the writer of the film Leigh Whannell who plays the teacher Doug. Doug has problems communicating with normal people due to his infinite scientific knowledge and the fact that he had a metal spike through his head when he was a kid. His character comes off very Norman Bates and awkwardly spouts crazed lines of dialogue throughout the movie breaking any silence and making it hilariously uncomfortable. At one point he straight up examines bile and feces from an infected with his bare hands spouting out his discoveries to the other teachers like it's just another day.

457518b9da57ab0ab57dcc16c7596f0cab5f84f8My only complaint about the film is when we get to a point where they could keep the film going it just ends. They make it through to another town after slicing and dicing through zombie kids, with a crazed martial arts janitor by the way, discovering where the virus came from and Doug even states that he could synthesize a cure, but then there's one more fight scene and it ends with a running gag set up on at the beginning of the film. I suppose this could lend itself to a sequel but it's still weird how it just sort of stops. The only other detractor I think for some people will be the back and forth between Brennan's writing and Whannell's. Whannell obviously loves to go super dark and scary and Brennan being a writer on Glee brings in the jokes, with the two combined you get extremely dark humor at times or just really nasty scenes. However with my twisted sense of humor I loved it. This also has one of the nastiest opening sequences ever that I highly suggest if you are a vegetarian you close your eyes and count to ten! If you can stomach it all though and are ready to laugh Cooties is the horror flick for you!

26 Days til' Halloween! Halloween!
26 Days til' Halloween! Silver Shsmrock!