A woman scientist stops an alien invasion with the help of her son who is immune. The movie opens with the main character Carol Bennell (played by Nicole Kidman) desperately searching for anything to keep her awake. She is in a store, which has been ransacked. All the shelves are in disorder and she is looking through mostly empty bottles in the pharmacy for drugs to keep her awake. She chugs a 2-liter of what appears to be mountain dew. All the employees are locked behind a door, which says Employees Only. The news announces the space shuttle has exploded and the news says it may be contaminated. Debris fell all over the Earth and people are told not to touch it. From D.C. to Dallas the organism has caused a massive quarantine. It is a spore. Anyone who touches it gets infected. Tucker who is Carol's ex-husband (played by Jeremy Northam) touches a piece of space debris and immediately is infected. His dog growls at him when he comes home. His girlfriend gets upset when he comes home so late.
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Carol wakes when her son Oliver (played by Jackson Bond) has a bad dream. The next day she takes him to school. It is Halloween so all the kids are in costume. Carol is picked up by Ben (played by Daniel Craig) her co-worker. Carol goes to her office and she learns from a patient, her husband is different. The patient says, the dog did not accept him and the dog attacked him and he killed the dog. When the kids are trick-or-treating a dog attacks one of the children. The kids fight over the candy from Halloween. Carol finds a specimen of the alien invasion. Carol takes it to Ben for analysis. It is like skin and grows fast. The scientists do not know what it is. The CDC announces the alien invasion is a flu and they offer a flu vaccine to stop it.
Carol gets a visit from a man she does not know. He says he is Mr. Link and he waits for his wife. Mrs. Link calls on the cell phone to say she is not coming. Wendy turns and runs away. Carol sees what she does, which is she gets in a cab to leave. Carol has an accident in the New York tunnel. The police acts very strangely. The police do nothing. Carol goes to a high-society party. Oliver notices something is wrong with his Dad. Carol knows the aliens have infiltrated. She gets on a commuter train. She is infected, but she fights it off. If she sleeps the aliens take control of her, but she refuses to sleep. The aliens have taken control over almost everyone. She pretends, she is infected. The aliens invite her to be one of them. She gets a call from Ben and she pretends to be a alien. The other aliens accept her as one of them. She finds her son. He is suspicious at first because he is still a normal human. Oliver tells her he fell asleep, but he did not get infected. Carol tells him he is immune. She runs away with her son. Most of the people in the street have already turned to aliens.
The aliens chase her but she and her son evade capture, until Carol's ex-husband finds them.
They hide while Carol's ex-husband chastises her for divorcing him. He finds them hiding. He physically attacks them. Carol hits him with a pipe to get a way. They find a pharmacy. It is the same one as at the beginning. Carol looks for medicine to keep her awake. If she falls asleep the aliens will take her body. She teaches her son how to wake her with an adrenaline shot to the heart if she happens to fall asleep. Ben comes to their rescue. Carol opens the door, which says “Employees Only” from her dream. She finds all the people changing to aliens inside. Neither Carol or her son goes to sleep. Carol takes massive amounts of pills to stay awake but it is not enough. She passes out from exhaustion. Her son gives her an adrenaline shot to the heart to wake her up and stop the alien conversion. Ben arrives to save her, but he is changed to an alien also. She pulls a gun on him. Ben says she should allow the invasion for the peacefulness of it. Ben is part of the invasion and it is one of peace but it is not human.. But they say there is no room in the world for her son who is immune.
They have a high-speed car chase, which ends in a crash. Carol is unconscious. The aliens come for the boy. Carol wakes up just in time, when a mass of aliens have covered the vehicle. She drives off throwing most of them from the vehicle and the rest she gets rid off by driving very erratic. Ben tells her on the radio how to make it to his location to escape. Carol gets to the building, Her escape ends in a fiery crash. Carol and her son are not hurt, They to go to the safe zone to be extracted by Ben. Carol fights off the aliens to get to the roof of the building, where Ben says he will save her from. She gets there just in time and she saves herself and her son. Her son provides the immunity to make a vaccine. This is how they are able to re-take control of the Earth.
Best part of story, including ending:
I think it is a great story when Carol's son is the one immune to the alien invasion and he provides the blood to make a vaccine.
Best scene in story:
I like the scene, which is first shown as a dream and then again as reality, where Carol searches for pills to keep her awake, because her desperation makes the move very suspenseful.
Opinion about the main character:
Carol is very intelligent and strong, In the end she ultimately prevails against the alien threat, which is admirable.
