Genre: Sci-Fi/Thriller
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Writer: Dwight Gallo
Based on the novel by Michael Crichton
Cast: Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, Laurence Fishburne, Sandra Oh, Dean Norris, Arliss Howard, Lorenza Izzo, Rachelle Lefevre, John Aylward, Tate Donovan
Plot: Dr. Jeremy Stone (Tom Cruise) is presentation about how to potentially activate innate immunities in the human body. Stone explains that he has discovered a specific gene that develops a receptor that would automatically develop microorganisms which activate a person's innate immunity to a variety of bacteria and viruses. A confused member of the audience asks what exactly that means to the lay person. Stone simply says that he has found a way that the human body can fight illnesses before they even happen.
After the presentation, Stone asks his colleague Dr. Amanda Albright (Rachelle Lefevre) how she thinks it went over with the audience. She says it didn't go over very well. They felt that what Stone is proposing would severely cripple the pharmaceutical industry, and the doctors in the audience know who keeps the lights on. Stone says that he suspected that could be an issue, but was hoping that people would have a more open mind on the subject.
A US military satellite, the Andromeda satellite, crash lands outside of the small desert town of Piedmont, New Mexico. An old man out hunting notices smoke in the distance and goes to investigate, finding the satellite. He loads it into the back of his pickup truck and drives toward town.
Colonel Smithson (Dean Norris), commander of the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases is informed of the satellite crash and instructs General George Starks (Laurence Fishburne), from the White Sands Army Base, to send a clean-up crew out to the site of the crash in Piedmont to collect the satellite since it could contaminate the nearby area.
Starks sends a team to Piedmont. The team finds the entire town is dead. The team decides to put on their gas masks, but it is too late. Starks watches a video feed from the town, but the Army team quickly start to succumb to a mysterious illness and die. Starks activates the Wildfire protocol.
Dr. Jeremy Stone receives a notification on his phone, informing him that the Wildfire protocol has been activated. He immediately starts packing a bag of clothing when he begins hearing the distant sound of a Black Hawk helicopter. When he leaves his house, the Black Hawk is in the process of landing in front of his house.
The helicopter takes Stone to the White Sands base where he is greeted by General Starks. They head into a briefing room where Stone finds the rest of the Wildfire team waiting for him: Army surgeon Dr. Mark Hall (Alec Baldwin), pathologist Dr. Catalina Bartoli (Lorenza Izzo), and microbiologist Dr. Ruth Kim (Sandra Oh). Starks briefs them on the situation, explaining that a satellite crashed down outside Piedmont and appears to have brought some sort of deadly microorganism with it, which quickly killed the team sent to retrieve the satellite in addition to what seems to be the entire population of the town.
Stone leads the rest of the Wildfire team into Piedmont. They walk through the town in military-grade decontamination suits searching for the satellite and investigating the outbreak. Hall and Bartoli inspects the body of one of the deseased Piedmont residents, quickly determining that whatever killed everyone coagulated the blood in the body, essentially turning the bloodstream in the human body into a jelly or sorts. While searching the town, they find a hysterical elderly man, Ed Jackson (John Aylward) and a colicky newborn baby who have not succumbed to what Stone refers to as the Andromeda Strain.
At a laboratory underneath the White Sands military base, Stone and Kim work together to extract a sample of the Andromeda strain from inside the satellite. When looking at under a microscope, Kim notices that Andromeda has no DNA or amino acids. Stone suggests that it very well could be of extraterrestrial origin.
In a separate section of the underground complex, Hall and Bartoli inspect Ed Jackson. They take a blood sample from the man, discovering that like the infant, his blood is highly acidic. Hall and Bartoli hypothesize that Jackson and the infant must not have been affected by the Andromeda strain due to their acidic blood.
The President of the United States, Bill Fisk (Arliss Howard), summons Col. Smithson and NSA director General Arthur Manchek (Tate Donovan) to explain to him what exactly is going on in Piedmont, New Mexico. Smithson reveals that the Andromeda satellite crashed just outside the town and released a deadly airborne microrganism upon the populace. President Fisk asks Gen. Manchek to explain the purpose of the satellite. Manchek reveals that the satellite was part of Project Scoop, specifically designed to collect biological samples inside of a wormhole. Manchek explains that the satellite malfunctioned upon approaching the wormhole and rapidly fell back to Earth. The President asks what his options are, and Manchek advises that they drop a nuclear bomb on Piedmont to wipe out the Andromeda strain before it spreads to other towns. President Fisk authorizes a small tactical nuclear strike on Piedmont in hopes of destroying the Andromeda strain.
General Starks informs Stone and the rest of the Wildfire team that the a nuclear strike on Piedmont has been authorized by the President. Stone urges Starks to try to stall the strike until they can test how the Andromeda strain reacts to irradiation. The team finds that the microorganism grows at an exponential rate when irradiated. Stone presents the test results to Starks, who gets on the phone to the White House to have the nuclear strike called off.
The fighter pilot is informed that the strike has been called off. As the jet flies over the Piedmont quarantine zone, the aircraft's controls begin to malfunction. Through a video feed on the jet, the President and the Wildfire team separately watch as all of the plane's plastic components disintegrate. The fighter jet, along with the nuclear missile, crash into the ground in Piedmont, causing the missle to detonate. The blast irradiates the Piedmont quarantine zone.
Examining the footage of the jet just before the crash, Stone and Kim thoerize that Andromeda has mutated in the open air environment, and must now be able to consume nylon. Kim checks on the sample of the Andromeda strain they collected from the satellite, and finds that it has begun degrading the rubber and plastic in the decontamination room it has been stored in. Kim starts running down a long corridor to notify the other members of the Wildfire team.
Hall and Bartoli are looking over some of the data collected from the Andromeda samples, and Bartoli happens to notice that the data is consistent with sulfur-based bacterium, so it may be vulnerable to other bacterium. They inform Stone, who has them help testing out every bacterium sample they have until they find something that can weaken the Andromeda strain. Stone finally tests it with Bacillus infernus, which he explains is only found in thermal vents. Bacillus infernus begins easily consuming the Andromeda sample. As they begin growing large amounts of the bacterium in culture vats so that they could spray the Piedmont quarantine zone with it, which would theoretically consume and sanitize the extraterrestrial Andromeda strain.
By the time Kim reaches the others, an alarm begins blaring through the complex. Stone calls Starks and asks what the alarm means, and Starks tells him that the breach sensor has been triggered at the underground lab complex, meaning that Andromeda has disintegrated the security seals, contaminating the labs. This has activated the complex's self-destruct sequence. Stone asks how they can deactivate it, and Starks explains that Dr. Hall is the only one able to deactivate the sequence. Stone asks why, and Starks explains that Hall was chosen because he was determined to be the most dispassionate of the team, thus he would be willing to let the complex self-destruct if necessary. Stone says that it isn't necessary since they have found a way to neutralize Andromeda, and a giant explosion would only cause Andromeda to further evolve. Starks tells Stone that he has 15 minutes to get Hall to use his thumb print on the self-destruct panel to deactivate the sequence.
Stone races through the corridors to find Hall, while the complex begins falling apart due to Andromeda spreading through the complex, degrading all of the plastic and rubbers. Stone finds Hall and tells him that they need to deactivate the self-destruct sequence. Hall begins running down the main corridor of the underground complex, with Stone following him. Suddenly, the floor begins to disintegrate, causing Hall to fall and break his back, rendering him paralyzed below the waist. Hall tells Stone that he needs to cut off his thumb to use it on the self-destruct panel. Stone pulls out a knife and begins sawing through Hall's thumb. Hall cries out in pain as Stone successfully amputates Hall's thumb.
Stone then rushes down the corridor to the control room. He uses Hall's severed thumb on the control panel, deactivating the self-destruct sequence with just moments to spare. When he goes back down the corridor, he finds Bartoli treating Hall's hand. Stone tells Bartoli to stay with Hall while he and Kim finish preparing the Bacillus infernus spray.
Stone and Kim finish making the anti-Andromeda spray and call Gen. Starks. They tell him that the spray will need to be dropped over Piedmont as well as the area above the lab complex. The bacteria spray drop is successful, with Smithson reporting to the President that all traces of the Andromeda strain have been eradicated from both the Piedmont quarantine zone as well as the complex below White Sands.
Gen. Manchek watches on a video screen as a sample labeled Andromeda is placed inside of a biosafety compartment. The video is a feed from a space station orbiting Earth.
Stone is dropped off back at his house by a Black Hawk helicopter. He walks into his house, sets his bag down and collapses on his bed. He comments to himself that he is now back in the real world.
No comments:
Post a Comment