Three friends making a web series about their town discover that their neighbours are being killed and replaced by creatures who are perfect copies of their victims.
As you can tell by the synopsis above, Assimilate is a modern retelling of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The original 1956 film has already been remade in 1978, 1993 (Body Snatchers), and 2007 (The Invasion). This latest remake (which was originally called Replicate) does not sway far from these previous incarnations, following the same plot direction in the first two acts, before deviating slightly to bring in a more modern angle in the final act.
Regardless of it's complete and utter lack of originality, Assimilate manages to pull off a reasonably entertaining display. For a B-movie, the cinematography is reasonable, with a surprising amount of wide shots showing off the expansive environments incorporated into the film. A bodycam perspective is utilised at times, giving a mix of the "found footage" vibe from Cloverfield, but is integrated into the story adding to the direction of the film beyond providing variety to the camera styles. The CGI is adequate. It is very obvious, but the use is kept to a minimum, with any creatures largely obscured from view.
Directed by John Murlowski--who is best known for his Christmas films, Santa with Muscles, A Golden Christmas, etc.--there are no real big names in the cast. The most notable cast member would be Andi Matichak, who was in the 2018 Halloween sequel (and will be in the future Halloween Kills and Halloween Ends sequels). She puts on the best performance from the characters, but overall, none of the acting performances stand out thanks to a lacklustre script that retreads the same ground that has been done time and time again.
The direction feels forced in many cases to give homage to (or simply copy) from the previous films, and the dialogue is equally inorganic. Luckily, our trio of protagonists are built up enough in the setup to be likeable characters. One some ways the script works well. The setup of the film is quite well-executed as we watch the characters uncover what is going on. This isn't a situation where exposition is dumped by the antagonists or revealed to the audience at the start of the film. Everything is revealed at the same time that the protagonists discover it. This does have the downside of not revealing certain information such as the motivations of the antagonists, but the mystery and intrigue do hold your interest for the first two acts.
It does lose a bit of interest in the final act. Once everything has been revealed, the story becomes formulaic and predictable, even with variations to the story thrown in, but ends on a nice note that leaves itself open to a potential sequel. Overall, Assimilate is surprisingly watchable. The cinematography of Damian Horan does a great job at keeping the film visually interesting, regardless of how overused the premise is.