Bezenby Another Bill Rebane film, so yet another interesting, if not entirely successful movie. This one involves a microorganism from Mars infecting several people at a rail depot. They feel fine, but the trouble is, if they fall asleep, their brains explode! This might also happen to the viewer too because you'll have a hard time staying awake during the long stretches of nothing in this film. That's being harsh. Every Bill Rebane film is worth a watch, but basically you have four people in a room, trying to stay awake by drinking coffee, arguing, smoking, and taking speed while scientists work hard on a cure. You get to see the brain exploding thing happen once, so if you're into films for the gore you might want to take that on board. Also: there's a boob. I wouldn't say this was as much fun as The Giant Spider Invasion or Demons of Ludlow, but more on a par with the equally strange and slow moving The Game. The acting is generally fine (especially from Buck Flower) and things do pick up near the end, but it's a bit of a slog. Worth a watch though, because I feel Bill Rebane always tried to make his films at least a bit different from the norm.

BF Deal For many years my connection to THE ALPHA INCIDENT was a long 35mm trailer that became a cult sensation amongst my pals, mostly for its perceived ineptness and terrible one-liners from the preview. The trailer itself is pretty inept, stopping almost dead half way thru for a long ticker-tape crawl that spells "until" as "untill"! Then a friend sent me a VHS of the film, only to discover that it was missing the first entire reel, highlighting and multiplying the absurdity (not that it made much difference). To me, more than the marginal acting and unreal situations and behavior, the thing it has going for it is really badly written and the dialog is delivered exceedingly poorly. The trailer has ten great/really BAD lines that deserve to be in its IMDb listing. Maybe this film was directed by passers by, but it is one of those films whose badness doesn't destroy its entertainment value..

Zeegrade I'll readily admit that I'm a little biased when it comes to Bill Rebane movies, he is after all the Ed Wood of the Midwest, but I think The Alpha Incident is far and away his best film. For all it lacks in budget and effects it more than makes up for in strong performances and storyline even if it is ripped off from The Andromeda Strain. An alien virus is found on samples of martian rock and it is determined that this strain must be dispatched immediately. In order to not arouse suspicion the virus is sent on a cargo train to Colorado with the mysterious Dr. Sorensen as its lone guard along with a moonshining hillbilly engineer Hank who is too curious for his own good. While Dr. Sorensen is asleep Hank inspects the toxic contents and, wouldn't you know it, breaks the vial cutting his hand in the process. The next morning the duo arrive at a remote track changing station that is run by the quiescent Charlie along with his secretary Jenny. Hank and Sorensen meet Jack Tiller who is changing train engines for the transfer ride when Hank's odd behavior tips off Sorensen that the virus has been tampered with. A call to Sorensen's military handler leads the five to become quarantined at the tiny office until the "top scientists" who bicker like an old married couple can find an antidote. Tempers rise and give way to fear as the four civilians are held captive by Dr. Sorensen's cryptic warnings of an alien virus that will kill them should anyone fall asleep. The bulk of the film concerns this fragile alliance out of the necessity for survival.There are no Oscar worthy performances here however I did feel that each of the main actors were portrayed pretty solidly. Dr. Sorensen plays the mystery man well, Jack Tiller the obnoxious loudmouth, Charlie the reserved man who secretly pines for his assistant and Jenny who sure knows how to fill a dress! I couldn't picture Paul Bentzen as a government scientist without constantly thinking of him in his role as Billy, Kester's megacreep cousin in Giant Spider Invasion. Watch for Menards pitchman Ray Szmanda as "The Official" all alone in his makeshift central command talking to himself. When Sorensen asked for supplies they should of had Ray go into his schtick ending with the usual teeth-grinding "at Menards!" looking as if he's about to drop dead of a heart attack. An acquired taste that might be a little too talky for most though it does have a pretty graphic death scene towards the end as well as Carol Irene Newell showing off some of her "talents". At least give it a try before ripping this review to shreds.

TheCrowing13 When I say I really related to this film, I mean by I felt how the characters did about 50 min in, bored. I was utterly pulling my brains out, just like the one, ONE gore scene in the whole film. Watching it reminded me of "George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead" upon reaming other people's responses to the film I see it is a common noticeable. Unlike most films depicting a group of people stuck in a room together there is no developing plot. There is little action/twists in the story. None of the characters appealed to me since they all seemed to have the intelligence of 10 year olds. The Story is simple a man decides to take a look at some crates he has no business looking into but does so, getting his dumb ass infected. Once the owner of the boxes finds out he quarantines himself and 4 other people possibly infected. Although he is the only guard the other members have many chances to escape, it's so not realistic it can't even work in this style of film. I was only entertained for a couple scenes in the film, one in particular is the death scene of a character from the virus. At first it's disappointing but then escalates to a great gore scene. Still this doesn't make up for all the other errors in the film. 2/10