Contamination (1980)

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

Coordinates: Some random dude under the influence of an alien cyclops tries to take over the world with exploding space avocados. Based on the documentary of the same name.

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Opening shot of New York City, where I get all my salsa.
• A long shot of the twin towers, don’t these monsters know what’s going to happen?
• Also a long shot of the Verrazano bridge. The most exciting of all bridges between Staten Island and Brooklyn. Always take the lower.
• Ah, I was wondering why I picked this movie: Directed by Lewis Coates! A.K.A. Luigi Cozzi, the mastermind behind Star Crash.
• Music by “The Goblin” in quotes. Isn’t it just Goblin? Maybe it’s a completely different knock-off group. Or just one lone goblin who makes music on a magic lute.
• These scientists are wearing hazmat suits that are completely open in the back, leaving them exposed to pathogens and nothing to the imagination.
• So they’re on an abandoned cargo ship in which the crew disappeared. One of them says it’s like something out of a movie, but it’s just a ship. I guess if the movie is Captain Phillips.
• Why are they wearing hazmat suits if they don’t know what happened on the ship? Or maybe that’s why they’re wearing them.
• So they run across some bodies that exploded from the inside. I guess I’d wear a hazmat suit for that too. If I was a big pussy.
• The respirators these scientists are wearing make it ideal for hearing their dialogue.
• They find some alien pods which look like… any other alien pods you’ve ever seen in a movie. Basically an avocado the size of an ostrich egg laid by an ostrich with an abnormally huge vagina.
• One of the eggs explodes in a couple of the scientists’ faces and they are fuuuucked.
• But no alien actually comes out of the egg? What’s the point of the egg then? Maybe we’ll find out over the course of the next 7 hours.
• So the scientist found the eggs in the cargo hold, but some of the crew were killed in their quarters, so were they trying to fuck the eggs when they exploded?
• Nothing quite like a dubbed Italian.
• I love that there’s a scientist in the background of this scene turning knobs for no real reason.
• I guess those scientists were NYPD, doesn’t really matter. The one who survived is hauled into a Little Italy underground lab and questioned by a little Italian woman.
• Well now these are hazmat suits. They look like the world’s cheapest medieval knight costume.
• Holy shit, I think they really blew up a rat for this scene. Astonishing. That’s what you get for constantly telling on people.

• Uh oh, this guy’s black, and in the Italian culture that’s a red flag. He and two other Italian fellas are in a warehouse full of space eggs and the fuzz show up, so the man of color shoots an egg so it explodes on them and makes them explode. I’m not sure why. Actually, I have no idea why.
• So long story short, the eggs are from Mars. Italians are from Venus.
• The main scientist lady is named Stella, just like Star Crash!!!
• There’s a disgraced scientist from the Mars egg mission and his shitty shirt matches his shitty couch.
• “I don’t know what Mars is.” Hubbard, I don’t find that believable.
• Here’s a scene of astronauts on Mars at the “polar ice cap” which is completely covered in ice and snow. Now I’m no astronominer, but I don’t think that’s accurate.
• Less egg more leg!
• This “The Goblin” score really tickles my taint. It sounds like it should be playing during the most intense Dig-Dug championship finals ever.

• The movie has ground to a screeching halt as we go to South America, home of the coffee grounds in which boxes the alien eggs were packed. [note to self: edit that sentence when you sober up so it makes sense]
• So after a promising start with exploding bodies, this picture is as dull as an avocado egg breakfast is delicious.
• Stella, Hubbard, and the cop are in South America, and I’m almost 86% certain Hubbard and the cop are going to have sex. It’s awesome to see LGBTQ representation in an Italian space horror flick from 1980.
• Stella takes a shower (no nudity) and someone comes in and plants an egg in the bathroom and… locks the bathroom door from the outside? Just get back in the shower, close the curtain, and get down in the tub with every towel over you, numbnuts.
• Why not instead of planting an egg just shoot her in the face?
• The eggs make the most adorable trumpeting sounds. It’s like a cartoon elephant who has trouble breathing.
• Basically there’s a bad guy who like has a psychic link with the eggs. How did we get here?

• Man this has gone downhill faster than a skier with a rocket up his ass and his mouth full of alien coffee beans.
• There’s about 20 minutes left and I’m still not sure why the eggs were on Mars and why they’re now on Earth and what the bad guy’s plan is. This movie fell apart faster than a poor girl’s prom dress.
• Ohhhh shit now they’re talking about a cyclops. I hope this is a literal cyclops like Clash of the Titans.
• So the bad guy is shipping the eggs around the world so they can take over the world, but all the eggs have done so far is explode, so what? What kind of plan is that?
• I think the bad guy was the other Mars astronaut, and his mind has been taken over by the egg overlord, or something? Doesn’t seem to matter much.
• “We’ve collected 248.” “EGGscellent!” At least that’s what I hope she said.

• Oh shit it’s only been 5 minutes since I said there was 20 minutes?
• Ahhhhh, here’s the alien. It is a cyclops! It heats the eggs and hypnotizes the weak-minded so they vote Trump to further .
• This alien appears to have two sideways space vaginas.
• The alien slightly hugged the cop to death. Not sure what the pension is for that.
• So Hubbard shoots the alien in the eyeball, Hamilton explodes, and the alien catches on fire for some reason. Much like the ending of Million Dollar Baby.
• “Mars, the cyclops star.” What.
• At the very end there are garbage bags full of eggs on the curb in front of the World Trade Center and they explode. Is Lewis Coates implying that’s what happened on 9/11? I’ll check the dark web.

Scare Stars: None whatsoever, it’s more of a sci-fi movie that happens to be gory in places.

Gore Galaxy: The only thing that will keep you awake. There are some really enjoyable low-budget so-cheesy-they’re-good gore effects. Almost all of them involve an extremely obvious balloon under the person’s shirt.

Nudity Nebula: Stella has a shower scene, but it’s cleaner than a bar of Irish Spring. The cop and the astronaut appear to have consensual sex in a scene that was cut for time.

Space Vacuum: Almost nonexistent. Everything takes place in sewers and warehouses. There’s a scene on “Mars” but it looks like a Kardashian’s uterus.

Best Transmission: “If you’re always in this condition its quite obvious you couldn’t get it up even if you used a crane.” Stella to Hubbard

Best Visual: Aside from the adorable gore effects, I gotta give it up for my friend the cyclops. He looked like if a garbage bag could take a shit, but in the most endearing way possible. I don’t think he even needed the hypnotism to get people to do what he wanted.

Worst Visual: The Verrazano bridge. It costs $19 to go over this son of a bitch! 

Universally: Dull, but kind of fun? Slow, but gory? But enough about me. There’s not a whole lot to this one. The gore effects are cheesier than a Wisconsin honeymoon and there’s barely enough in between to hold your interest, but it’s not a complete waste of time, especially if you’re into giallo, or Jello, or Mello-Yello.

Analysis: 4.5 Eyes of the Cyclops (out of 10)