- Directed by Brock Eisner
- Written by Scott Kosar, Ray Wright
- Stars Timothy Olyphant, Radha Mitchell, Danielle Panabaker
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 40 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7w9uWFIMBs
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
This is another one that we get to see unfold and figure out what’s going on along with the characters. The opening scene is one of disaster. Then we go back to two days earlier to see what led to that point, and we go beyond it. It’s pretty realistically done, the cast is all fine, special effects are great. It’s one that slipped under a lot of people’s radar, but is worth the watch for sure.
Synopsis
We see a disaster, then we flash back two days earlier. Dr. Judy gives her assistant Becca the afternoon off to go to the baseball game. David is the sheriff, and he’s at the game as well. As the game progresses, the cops there notice a man walking onto the field carrying a gun. David goes out to stop the man as everyone else clears the field. It’s Rory, the town’s “reformed” drunk, who isn’t usually violent. Rory points the gun at David, so David shoots him. We zoom out to see airplanes leaving chemtrails over the town of Ogden Marsh. Credits roll.
The next morning, Judy tells her husband David that he did the right thing. The ME calls and explains that Rory hadn’t been drinking at all. What made him go off like that? David goes back to the baseball field and talks to Principal Ben, who seems completely out of it. Judy sees patients, and patient Bill seems very distracted and zoned out. His wife says he’s not right, and he doesn’t seem that way, but the doctor can’t find anything actually wrong with him. She sends him home with them, ordering rest and more advanced tests in a bigger town next week if he’s not improved. That night, Bill gets a knife and forces his family to hide in the closet. Then Bill locks them in and sets fire to the house, killing them both. David and Judy go over there, and it’s clear that Bill has lost his mind.
The next morning, a bunch of hunters find a parachute and a dead body in the swamp. Bill’s in custody, and David comments that he’s giving exactly the same look Rory gave him. The sheriff investigates the skydiver, and looks for a crashed airplane as well. They soon find a big plane sunk in the swamp. We zoom out to see satellite visuals of the area. Someone is watching.
David considers that the swap drains into the town’s drinking water. The mayor says he won’t turn off the town’s water supply under any circumstances. David then shuts it all down anyway. Deputy Russell finds Bill apparently dead in his cell. No, he’s faking it, and his craziness has gotten a lot worse. Just then they discover the phone lines are out. So is cell service and the Internet. The streets are deserted.
There’s a disturbance in the mortuary. David investigates and finds a man with his mouth sewn shut. The mortician has gone insane as well, but Russell comes in and saves the day. David sends Russell to get help. That night, Judy refuses to leave town, but David really wants her to get out. Out of nowhere, a bunch of military guys load David and Judy onto a bus at gunpoint. Russell and many others are already on board. Russell says he was intercepted on the way out of town.
They are taken to a huge compound with a bunch of medical and military personnel. They’re checking people’s temperature. Judy’s got a temperature, so they lock her away separate from David. There’s a shootout with some hunters in a pickup who breach the fence, and a bunch of the sick people break out of their enclosure in panic.
They take Judy to a hospital where everyone is wearing contagion suits. David is taken to a huge truck stop at the edge of town and held there with many others. He wants to go back for Judy. Judy finds Becca strapped to the table next to her; they can’t escape.
At the medical compound, the military starts to pull back since things are spiraling out of control. David meets up with Russell, who also escaped from the sick zone.
Principal Ben comes into the sick area and starts stabbing people with a pitchfork until David comes in and shoots him before he can kill Judy. They decide to try to get out of town, and we see that the town is burning in multiple places, which is where the pre-credit sequence began. Wrecked vehicles and debris are everywhere. Judy wonders if she’s actually sick or if she had the temperature because she’s pregnant.
They stop to pick up Scotty, Becca’s boyfriend, and they run into more military guys. They watch Scotty and his mother gunned down and burned by the soldiers. They make it to David and Judy’s house, but they run into Rory’s family, who are heavily infected now. Russell shoots them both, and the group continues. Judy thinks Russell is infected; he wouldn’t shoot people like that… would he? He is looking sweaty and erratic.
They drive into a car wash to avoid the helicopters. The car wash activates and pulls the car in. They’re attacked by more crazies, and they lose Becca. When they get out to check on Becca, the helicopter blows up their car.
They capture an intelligence guy, and he explains that it was a biological weapon that was on the plane and infected the town. The crash was an accident. “After 48 hours, you’re either dead or you don’t have it.“ Russell then shoots the guy halfway through the conversation; he’s clearly infected.
Russell holds Judy and David at gunpoint as they continue walking. David finally disarms Russell, who realizes he’s infected but promises to behave and begs to tag along. They continue on until they find another military checkpoint. Russell volunteers to be a distraction so the other two can sneak past the camp. That goes badly for Russell, but it does go according to plan.
David and Judy make it to the truck stop, which had been their goal, but everyone has gone. David goes inside, while Judy looks around out back. They find a truckload of dead people; the army exterminated everyone, not just the sick.
David finds a radio and overhears an aircraft saying something about “T minus ten minutes on the countdown.” Judy soon learns that they aren’t as alone as she thought and hides among the corpses to avoid the men. There’s still time for one more big battle with crazies before they can steal a semi and leave.
They take the truck down the road toward Cedar Rapids. They hear the countdown continuing on the radio and speed up. When zero hits, what looks like a nuke over the little town goes off, vaporizing all the infected, non-infect, and everything else. The truck goes off the road and crashes in the shock wave, but the pair survives.
The two walk on, and we eventually see the big city just ahead of them. We then see a computer readout explaining that it’s time to “contain” Cedar Rapids as well. It’s not over.
Commentary
Timothy Olyphant is always good. He often plays the exact same character, but at least he’s good at it. Everyone else here is fine, but the real star here is the mystery behind what’s going on.
It unfolds slowly, and it’s fun watching the mess build. We don’t know if it’s a plague, a contaminant, or some kind of zombie thing until about halfway in.
The action scenes are good, but not unbelievable. The “crazies” use weapons and can think, so they aren’t typical undead zombies, but otherwise, it’s pretty much the same kind of thing.