Cooties (film)

In Fort Chicken, Illinois, a batch of badly made chicken nuggets containing a mutant virus arrives at Fort Chicken Elementary. A student, fourth-grader Shelley Linker, consumes one of the tainted black-dotted chicken nuggets. Meanwhile, an aspiring horror writer named Clint Hadson substitutes at Fort Chicken Elementary, where he is reunited with his former high school crush Lucy McCormick, whom he learned is dating the physical education teacher Wade Johnson.

During Clint's class, a kid named Patriot is attacked by the blister-ridden and increasingly feral Shelley after he inadvertently pulls a pigtail out of her scalp, with Clint being scratched by her before she flees. After Patriot is taken to the nurse's office, Patriot's friend Dink confronts Shelley while she attempts to dig her way out of the school. Dink plans to report Shelly to the principal's office by turning her in, but Shelley ends up infecting Dink, who then spreads it throughout the playground by scratching the majority of the children before they all proceed to kill several staff members including Mr. Peterson, Vice Principal Simms, and Sheriff Dave.

Later, Clint, Lucy, Wade, and the other surviving staff members (consisting of Doug Davis, Tracy Lacey, and Rebekkah Halverson) are forced to flee the faculty lounge when attacked by Patriot. After escaping to the library and being joined by an uninfected student named Calvin, the staff barricades themselves in the music room. Wade notices Clint has been scratched by Shelley and quarantines him; meanwhile, Doug deduces that Clint is only experiencing symptoms of stomach flu as the virus does not affect adults like it does on children. A sole uninfected student full of wisdom, Calvin concludes that "cooties" are the culprit behind the infection, completely moving the entire staff.

The staff plans to head to the roof at the end of the school day to call out to the arriving parents for help, only to watch the first arriving parent be killed by her own child before they are forced back into the school. As Wade is forced to kill Dink when he followed them into the auditorium, the group is joined by a teenager named Tamra, who they found was scratched by one of the infected kids. Doug concludes from his autopsy of Dink that the infected children are mostly brain dead and the virus only affects people that haven't gone through puberty, meaning that Tamra is safe. As Patriot takes out the power, the group sees that Calvin starts passing out from diabetic shock as they escape with the school janitor Hitachi and take refuge with him.

The group sends Clint through the ventilation system to get a chocolate bar for Calvin, along with Wade's truck keys and their cellphones. Lucy joins Clint and they manage to secure a chocolate bar to bring Calvin out of diabetic shock. Clint and Lucy are separated from the group and get trapped in the library, where they confess their feelings for each other and kiss. Shortly after, Wade apologizes to Lucy for his behavior over a walkie-talkie. Clint knocks out several children with pills and he and Lucy reconvene with Wade and the others as they made themselves improvised weapons. The staff fights their way through the hallway and the parking lot, with Hitachi being overwhelmed by the infected children inside the school, while Wade stays behind to ensure the others get away. Patriot, having hidden in Wade's truck bed, attacks Clint and ends up being crushed against a tree with the truck.

The group continues to the nearby town of Danville (Fort Chicken's rival town) before Wade's truck runs out of gas, finding the town similarly overrun while learning the viral infection has spread across the country. Several children ambush them, and they barricade themselves inside a children's entertainment building where they retrieve a contaminated chicken nugget for Doug to study in hope of developing a vaccine. They are later cornered in a playroom by Shelley and the infected children. Wade and Hitachi arrive in a van and help the group escape the room. Wade uses a massive beach ball to barricade the children inside while spraying them with a water gun filled with gasoline, lighting the gasoline trail to burn the building down. They manage to escape, driving out of the town to "someplace kids don't wanna go" as Shelley burns to death in pursuit.

In a post-credits scene, Hitachi is seen at the school, sitting in a chair and having his snack, and finishes telling a story he was telling the teachers earlier.

The film premiered on January 18, 2014, at the Egyptian Theatre in Park City, Utah during the 2014 Sundance Film Festival where it was selected to be featured in the "Park City at Midnight" program.[11] The original planned release date in the United States was October 10, 2014. The film had its premiere opening night at the Stanley Film Festival on April 30, 2015.[12] The film went onto screen at the Fantasia International Film Festival on July 17, 2015.[13] The film had its Los Angeles premiere on September 3, 2015, at SpectreFest.[14] It has also been selected to screen at the Sitges Film Festival on October 10, 2015.[15]

The film was released direct-to-video in the United Kingdom on October 12, 2015.[22] and in Germany on October 15, 2015.[23]

• Cooties at IMDb
• Cooties at Rotten Tomatoes
• Cooties at the ComingSoon.net