The Screwfly Solution (Masters of Horror)

"The Screwfly Solution" is the seventh episode in the second season of Masters of Horror. It is based upon the 1977 science fiction short story of the same name by Alice Sheldon (under the alias Raccoona Sheldon), credited in the film as James Tiptree, Jr. Many of the scenes in Sam Hamm's script are expansions of single lines in this epistolary story. Director Joe Dante read the story in the 1980s and had wanted to make a film version ever since. He presented the story as straight horror, eschewing his usual humor and without using his usual company of stock actors. Jason Priestley and Elliott Gould star.

Plot
When a virus overcomes the male population of the world and turns them into murderous psychopaths, a mother and daughter escape across a country where their safety is in question.

Over the summer, a rash of femicides break out all over the world, which comes to the notice of Anne Alstein (Kerry Norton), whose husband Alan (Jason Priestley) is working alongside Barney (Elliott Gould) on the solution to an insect problem in the rain forest. The two have a daughter, Amy (Brenna O'Brien). Their friend, epidemiologist Bella Sartiano (Linda Darlow), leaves for Jacksonville, Florida, where a large amount of femicides took place. She interviews an infected U.S. Army soldier, Private William Holicky (Steve Lawlor), who savagely murdered a stripper at a club. The aggression is linked to sexual arousal, and many of the infected men use extremist religious rhetoric to justify the murders. Bella discovers that tens of thousands of similar murders are happening elsewhere in the world before being attacked and killed by the infected mayor.

Before her death, Bella informed Barney of the epidemic as they were coordinating matching findings. Barney and Alan head to Washington D.C. to brief a panel of high-ranking officials on whether the cause of the condition is natural or bioterrorism, concluding that the only way to prevent it is through either chemical castration or surgical castration. The reception is skeptical and indignant; the US Army General on the panel bluntly declares he will oppose this drastic solution, thereby ensuring his troops will turn on female personnel and civilians once they become infected. Barney takes the shot, but Alan refuses, stating he'll be fine with pills, until he begins to have dreams of killing Anne. On the plane ride home, Alan witnesses two murders and realizes that every man on the plane is infected, himself included. He calls his wife and daughter to say goodbye, telling them that he won't be himself by the time he gets back to them.

In September, Anne and Amy have continued northward to Canada with other women. The two encounter the infected Alan in their cabin in the Ontario rainforest, where he begins sexually assaulting his daughter until Anne shoots him in the legs. At the struggling Alan's insistence that she destroy whatever is left of him, they escape, but Amy, not understanding the situation, rebels against her mother and steals their car that night and returns to Alan. Anne arrives at the cabin too late to save her. It is presumed that she was forced to kill Alan. Anne falls unconscious and wakes up in a hospital where the female patient population is being murdered. A hooded Barney tells her that she was comatose for three days. They manage to escape, and Anne agrees to wear a "man" disguise to hide herself from the infected men. She overhears a conversation between two men, revealing that the area's female population has been wiped out. It is implied that the adult men turn on less-masculine boys next, killing them off as well.

Forced to live in a simple camping tent during a harsh winter, Barney soon falls ill. He encourages Anne to survive no matter what, as mankind still has a chance with a female survivor. In November, he dies peacefully and Anne buries him. Journeying to a convenience store for supplies, she is discovered by hunters who begin following her in their car. She speeds away to hide her car in the woods and wait them out, and there discovers the source of the epidemic: bright aliens formed of light are the culprits, using alien technology to create the femicide epidemic as a form of biological control (the titular "screwfly solution"). They kill the hunters that pursued Anne, apparently to take some of their brain matter, and she watches them from nearby, hiding under the cover of bushes. Sometime afterwards, Anne is seen shivering outside a cave in a snowstorm.

By December, all female life on Earth is presumed to have been exterminated, leaving the infected men to slowly die off.

Production
When interviewed while shooting the film in Vancouver, the director summarized it: "It's vaguely political. It's not political in the same way that 'Homecoming' is. It is about a plague that starts in the southern half of the U.S. and moves around the rest of the world. It is a story in which men are moved to kill all the women. It is extremely dark." The film was shot using a digital camera for the first time. The director chose this experimental technique especially to give the film a different look. Jason Priestley explained his interpretation of the motivation of the scientist Alan, stating: "For me, his knowledge and his level of understanding is what drives him as a character, and then his love for his wife and his daughter. That's what ends up giving him the moment of clarity before he figures it out. But, it's a heavy piece. It's a heavy piece for him. I always look for characters and try to play characters that have a turn, that aren't just one note."

Release
The film was screened at the 24th Turin Film Festival. The DVD was released on June 12, 2007.

Reception
Michael Gingold of Fangoria magazine, awarded the film three skulls for its "stinging mix of sociopolitical commentary and traditional horror mayhem". He saw the political message as a link between religious fervor and misogyny with special reference to Islamic fundamentalism. The effect of violent horror movies upon men within the story was thought to be witty self-reference though the overall tone was considered "deadly serious". The lead actor, Jason Priestley, was thought to have been weaker than the role required while the performances of Kerry Norton, as Alan's wife Anne, and Brenna O'Brien, as her daughter Amy, were thought sympathetic and more effective.

Peter Brown of iF magazine felt that the presentation of the main feature was too rushed and would have been better at 1.5 to 2 hours rather than the 58 minutes allowed by the 1 hour format. Also the denouement was revealed too soon and so suspense was lacking in the second half. He thought that the DVD extras were interesting, providing Joe Dante's account of the conversion from the short story and details of the effects used for the aliens in the story. Overall, his rating for this DVD was C.