'Infirmary' is an Average Found Footage Film that Struggled with Executing a Great Horror Concept

This is one of the few times that I’m upset I listened to critics on this one. Before Infirmary was released on Shudder, this film was being heavily praised online, and I was so excited to watch the film. It had been a long time since I had seen a really good found footage horror film, and I was really looking forward to this one. 

Instead, I was met with a dull film that felt like it didn’t know how to deliver a storyline that was pretty fascinating, and the execution of these ideas did not really go anywhere. 

And what sucks, is that Infirmary had a really strong start, that slowly dwindled into a mediocre execution. 

We follow the story of a young dude named Edward, who has been hired for a security job in an abandoned hospital that is going to be torn down very soon. Right away, we are introduced to some of the best camera work I have seen in a found footage horror film. We get cameras in every location of the hospital, following the characters from all angles, including body cam footage from a first person point of view. 

Upon getting hired, Edward is instantly thrown into two scary scenes that made me excited for what I was about to watch. He gets jump scared by a bathroom door closing from his body cam footage, and then he hears an eerie loud machine like sound deep in the hospital, that freaked out the protagonist. We then learn from the head security guard named Lester, that the hospital was once owned by a couple that experimented on their patients, transporting the minds of their patients into mannequins. 

I was so invested in this story, wondering how the mannequin possessions were going to be like, once we were introduced to a small group of mannequins in one part of the building. It was such a promising start, and I was expecting a full on scare fest, with a great storyline. 

I wished I had chosen another movie for the month of October. I do tend to watch one boring horror film for the hell of it every year in October, but this one was probably the most boring one I have ever seen. These excellent ideas don’t really form a good execution, and it feels so lackluster by the time the film ends. The scares aren’t even that good either. The only parts that scared me were the very beginning of the film with Edward’s reaction to the bathroom door closing and the creepy sound, and a very well done mannequin chase scene that freaked me out pretty bad. 

Other than that, the film was just alright with the scares. The jump scares were your typical cliche, and it really sucks, because the horror concept of mannequins taken over by humans sounds pretty damn scary…right?

Somehow, the movie found a way to make this concept so utterly boring.

Another storyline that the movie failed miserably to execute in the very end involved the dark backstories of our two main leads. 

Edward was introduced as a discharged war veteran that had gone through a tough situation behind the scenes. While he is being asked by another worker in the building to fill out the rest of the application, he admits that he won’t be able to fill out the veteran part. He had been discharged after hurting his shoulder, and he failed to report it right away, because he decided to get checked out much later. He admits that he is stuck fighting the system, determined to receive the benefits that he deserves. I was on Edward’s side here, feeling so bad for the guy. 

Then we get very odd hints during the movie that Edward…could be lying about his background. 

He tells Lester that he was pissed that he couldn’t kill a guy while he was in the service, he pretends to get shot and die while lying on a hospital bed, and then he pretends to fight and shoot invisible people during his shift. 

I instantly knew that this guy was lying, and the movie does confirm this at the end, but it was so poorly done. The mad woman that had been married to the crazy dude that conducted the experiments with humans and mannequins, went after Edward, knowing that he was a fraud. 

The problem is that we never get outright confirmation of who is exactly hunting him. The woman that helped him with the application was named Ms. Downey, and she either got possessed by the mad woman, or she was her secretly the whole time. We also learn pretty quickly that Ms. Downey was already dead, taking away the mystery of the film so fast. We barely get any screen time with her either, making the supernatural stuff feel kind of odd. 

Then we get Lester’s backstory, but it’s only revealed after he dies, while trying to turn on the breakers in the hospital, electrocuting himself by accident. He refused to answer Edward’s questions, of why he was let go from his cop position. Lester had apparently hurt someone by accident while drinking on the job, and he still would drink in the basement of the hospital. This information is thrown at us after his death by Ms. Downey, but it feels weird. 

I feel that the movie should have made both men endure psychological torture at the hands of the evil couple that ruled over the hospital before their deaths, using the mannequins as their weapons against these men. 

That storyline would have been so awesome, and a little scary. This movie really did waste a great story that could have gone in an interesting direction, and we were given a plot that struggled to get through it’s great ideas. 

Plus, we get a random intruder that breaks into the hospital, but even that doesn’t go anywhere, despite the movie making a big deal about this random character that we never see again. This intruder escapes through a window, and that is pretty much it for this character’s screen time. 

And it also really sucks how Edward felt like wasted potential too. This actor that played him did a very good job with what he was given, and I think if he was given a proper script, this dude could have delivered a great, realistic performance for a horror experience like this. 

It sucks when you waste time on a boring flick. 

So, in other words, I would not recommend this movie to anyone. The camera work is literally the best part of the movie, including the acting from the main lead. 

That’s the only good I can say about this film. 

Thank you for reading!

Emy Quinn