The film really is comparable to The Andromeda Strain in the way the people are isolated together quickly over a virus and they are forced to deal with each other while trying remain alive and time is ticking away. But the way each film plays out, how the incident happens, the characters and interactions with each other and the ending of both movies are very different from one another. The Alpha Incident and The Andromeda Strain would make a great double feature together due to their similarities.With this movie, you'd never believe how interesting it can be when 4 people plus one government man (5 people total) stuck together by enforceable isolation in a train station over a virus can be really interesting but it is! There's a lot of talking, trying to find things to do, lots of worrying over what this particular strand of virus can do... a few flashes to the big military man and the scientist trying to find an antidote *bam* we have a good movie!! I really enjoyed this one!! 8.5/10

The idea was very good. An andromeda Strain clone film. Except this focuses on the victims rather than the germ & was nowhere near as well done.This film reminds me of the movie, "They shoot horses don't they" which was the most boring, dragged out movie I ever had the displeasure to see. That movie was so horrible it was physically painful to watch. The only other film which affected me like that was "Stop the world, I want to get off". I think "Bus Stop" was another of those movies like this.This movie also just drags & drags like those other films, with the handful of victims ranting & babbling & going stir crazy in a rural train station trying to stay awake. I had seen it before so I was more than happy to fast forward through all the ravings of the victims & just watch the interactions between the gov't agent, military & lab sequences. Much better. I had forgotten the ending. Sad but quite probable of the gov't.In fact, in reality they would have used infra-red to find the escapee then they would have incinerated the entire area, victims & all & claimed it was a plane crash. The lab scientists would have been using Biohazard level 4 suits & facilities at Ft Deitrick.The exploding brain sequence was quite an eye opener in more than one way.If the director had not spent so much time on the monotony of victims dialogue going stir crazy & more time on the lab, technical aspects, involvement & origin of the organism, it could have been made into a great movie. That was the fault of the director & screenwriter. There was clearly not enough research done on gov't handling of biohazards for this movie. A remake would have to be quite different to set apart from Andromeda Strain.Watchable if you can tolerate the monotony of victims raving as they mentally melt down or fast forward through those portions.

The Alpha Incident involves a microorganism from Mars escaping due to the stupidity and carelessness of a railroad baggage handler. Not to mention the imbecility of NASA scientists sending the thing by regular express mail so as to not cause any attention.So now with the quick thinking that characterizes science fiction movies like these the organism is quarantined at a remote rail station and five people are kept in isolation while scientists work to find a cure, for what they're not sure, but we soon see.The only cast name I'm sure you might remember is Ralph Meeker, the rest are total unknowns, at least to me they are. The film is an interesting idea, but one more suited to a television episode of The Outer Limits.

When I say I really related to this film, I mean by I felt how the characters did about 50 min in, bored. I was utterly pulling my brains out, just like the one, ONE gore scene in the whole film. Watching it reminded me of "George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead" upon reaming other people's responses to the film I see it is a common noticeable. Unlike most films depicting a group of people stuck in a room together there is no developing plot. There is little action/twists in the story. None of the characters appealed to me since they all seemed to have the intelligence of 10 year olds. The Story is simple a man decides to take a look at some crates he has no business looking into but does so, getting his dumb ass infected. Once the owner of the boxes finds out he quarantines himself and 4 other people possibly infected. Although he is the only guard the other members have many chances to escape, it's so not realistic it can't even work in this style of film. I was only entertained for a couple scenes in the film, one in particular is the death scene of a character from the virus. At first it's disappointing but then escalates to a great gore scene. Still this doesn't make up for all the other errors in the film. 2/10