Isolation (Billy O'Brien)

Isolation (Billy O'Brien) 42 – The glib “Alien-on-a-dairy-farm” description that I’d been hearing to describe this bit of Mad Cow unease turns out to be pretty accurate, which isn’t to imply that this is totally unimaginative. It has a few great freak-out scenes near the start, in which the bulk of the terror emanates from a cow’s vagina (replete with shots from a vagina-cam!), but it’s a moodier, more deliberately paced piece than that beginning would have you believe. As it continues to up the gore ante, it prompted plenty of walkouts, culminating on a visceral autopsy on a baby calf that had people streaming away before it got any worse.

Unfortunately for those who stayed, it really doesn’t great worse than that disgusting scene, becoming afterwards a more conventional monster movie, in which characters roam an enclosed space trying not to be killed by said monster. Alas, it lacks Ridley Scott’s visual sensibility, which means that’s not really enough to sustain a high level of interest. Its incredibly dirty sets begin to look the same after a while, and its cast never makes enough of an impression to inspire too much sympathy, with the exception of a somewhat fun mad scientist performance.