COLD STORAGE movie poster |  ©2026 Samuel Goldwyn Films

Rating: R
Stars: Joe Keery, Georgina Campbell, Liam Neeson, Lesley Manville, Sosie Bacon, Vanessa Redgrave, Ellen Torchia, Aaron Heffernan
Writer: David Koepp, based on his novel
Director: Jonny Campbell
Distributor: Samuel Goldwyn Films
Release Date: February 13, 2026

COLD STORAGE posits that a fungus sample, used for experiments on Skylab, combined with an extraterrestrial substance before or during the space station’s crash into the Indian Ocean and western Australia in 1979.

An enterprising Australian in an extremely small desert town got hold of a piece of Skylab debris and has been displaying it as a tourist attraction when, in 2007, the fungus starts acting up. A panicked townie manages to phone xenobiologist Dr. Hero Martins (Sosie Bacon), who takes the threat seriously enough to go to Australia with U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) operatives Robert Quinn (Liam Neeson) and Trini Romano (Lesley Manville) in tow. They, and we, learn quickly that the fungus can make people behave badly, and then explode.

The lone surviving fungus sample is confined far underground in a DTRA facility outside another small town, this one in eastern Kansas. Alas, as the years go by and the DTRA copes with other matters, the peril posed by the fungus is forgotten by almost everyone. The building (and its multiple basements) is sold and transformed into a self-storage business, open 24/7.

All young night shift guard Travis, aka Teacake (Joe Keery), wants to do is keep his job. That’s until he meets his new storage guard partner, veterinary student and young single mom Naomi (Georgina Campbell). Travis is instantly smitten. As he admits himself, Travis is the sort of person who is easily talked into doing things by others. So, when Naomi wants to find out why a beeping alarm is going off and where the sound is coming from, it doesn’t take Travis long to agree to go exploring with her.

For reasons that are decently established early on, a number of other people descend on the storage space. Since showing a Neeson character in the opening is akin to introducing Chekhov’s gun in the first act, we have no doubt that he’ll reappear to address the beeping and at least attempt to save the world from the continually mutating goop.

Although it has way more gore and swearing than an ‘80s mainstream horror actioner, that’s the vibe of COLD STORAGE. David Koepp, who wrote several JURASSIC PARK films, including the topnotch original based on Michael Crichton’s book, here adapts his own novel, knows how to bring the fun and the tension and even the exasperation in just the right doses. The dialogue is consistently engaging and the protagonists are agreeable, including Neeson’s Quinn, who suffers through much of the proceedings with a bad back.

Director Jonny Campbell, making his feature film debut here, has a great grasp of pacing and timing. He’s not going for jump scares as much as jump splats, which usually work even when we expect them. He utilizes interiors of bodies and objects to depict the progress of the fungus, partly so we understand how it turns up in unlikely areas and partly just for the “eww” factor. The tightrope between playfulness and will-they-make-it suspense is walked with enthusiastic grace.

Even the musical choices are on target. On consideration, it’s perhaps surprising that the Beach Boys’ “I Get Around” hasn’t been used with this type of spreading menace before.

Neeson has exactly the right attitude, taking things seriously enough but with a bit of humor. He is matched by the always-sublime Manville. Keery, whose presence can’t help but remind us of STRANGER THINGS, is the epitome of a good-hearted underdog. Campbell is persuasively smart and sympathetic. Bacon is suitably concerned as the main scientist. Other notable performances are given by Ellen Torchia, Allan Heffernan, Gavin Spokes and an almost unrecognizable Vanessa Redgrave (as a storage unit owner).

Some movies have a “No animals were harmed in the making of this film” disclaimer. COLD STORAGE gives us reassurance that “No real animals were used in the making of this film.” (The only complaint this reviewer has here is that the VFX people should have perhaps considered that deer herds usually have does as well as stags.)

Early on, COLD STORAGE also has the supertitle, “Pay attention – this s*** is real.” Literally it isn’t, but metaphorically, it is – conditions are ripe for an ecological disaster where the official response will be too little, too late – which gives this enjoyable film a bit of disquieting resonance

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