Lede

A film that time-stamps everything except the actors’ faces.

Hermit Off Script

Cold Storage is exactly why Liam Neeson is a one-man warranty: you see his name, you stop interrogating the purchase, and you walk in expecting Irish grit, a few cold one-liners, and competence under pressure. And to be fair, it delivers the things I keep begging other films to do: it actually understands time, it labels the past and the present cleanly, and it shoots the “now” with the kind of crisp, modern clarity that makes some so-called future movies look like they were filmed in the past and never told. It is a proper action thriller horror cocktail, with Neeson doing what he does best: turning panic into procedure. But then it commits two crimes against my retinas: those stuck-on hazmat camera views that add nothing, not story, not tension, not even runtime savings, just a weird, clunky reminder that someone on set discovered a GoPro and got emotional. And the flashback casting… look, the military experts are meant to be in earlier events, yet the faces say “present day”, loudly. If you do not know the actors’ real ages, maybe you let it slide in the present. In the past, it is harder, because the film is literally telling you when you are. And nobody even bothered to make them look younger, not even a basic polish. So there I was in a normal cinema screen, feeling like I was watching my home telly, just with stickier floors. Which is why I keep thinking cinemas need to upgrade the standard screens and sound to something IMAX-adjacent, because smart glasses are coming for the “big screen experience” like a silent mould in the vents. Maybe I’m doomering. Or maybe I’m just reading the timeline.

Cold Storage (2026) | Official Trailer

Cold Storage | Movie synopsis

When a long-buried military experiment resurfaces inside an ordinary self-storage facility, a forgotten Cold War mistake mutates into a modern biological nightmare. Decades earlier, a classified operation sealed away a fast-spreading parasitic fungus beneath layers of concrete and bureaucratic denial. In the present day, routine maintenance cracks open what history tried to forget.

As infection spreads through corridors meant for furniture and family heirlooms, an unlikely trio – a former government operative who knows more than he admits, a sharp but underpaid facility worker, and a scientist forced to confront past cover-ups – must contain a threat designed to outlive them all. The organism adapts, multiplies, and turns human hosts into carriers of something far worse than disease: panic.

With timelines that connect past negligence to present chaos, Cold Storage blends action, horror, and dry humour into a tight, escalating siege story. The real enemy is not only the fungus growing in the walls, but the institutional shortcuts that buried it there in the first place.

Some things should stay sealed. Others were never meant to survive the calendar.

Cast and credits

Director: Jonny Campbell
Writers: David Koepp (screenplay, based on his 2019 novel)
Genre: Horror – Sci-Fi – Comedy
Main cast: Joe Keery, Georgina Campbell, Liam Neeson, Lesley Manville, Sosie Bacon, Vanessa Redgrave
Composer: Mathieu Lamboley
Production company/studio: StudioCanal, Pariah
Runtime: 1h 39m
Release year and platform: 2026, cinemas

What does not make sense

• The film respects the calendar so much it labels the decades, then asks you to ignore the decades on people’s faces. [Guardian]
• A self-storage facility built over a sealed government nightmare is treated like “fine, chuck some padlocks on it”. [Rotten Tomatoes]
• The camera goes full-bodycam through infection horror, but the hazmat-view detours feel like the director accidentally leaned on a settings menu. [Guardian]
• The movie warns “Pay attention” up front, then wastes your attention on shots that do not change the story. [Guardian]
• Cinemas charge cinema money while delivering “large home screen” vibes, and then act surprised when people stay home.

Sense check / The numbers

1. The story explicitly jumps back to 1979 and then fast-forwards to the early 00s before landing in the storage-facility present, and the UK release date is 20 February 2026. [Guardian]
2. Runtime is 1h 39m (99 minutes) and the US theatrical wide date is 13 February 2026, with an R rating listed for violence, language, and gore. [Rotten Tomatoes]
3. Box Office Mojo lists $1,357,066 domestic, $559,402 international, and $1,916,468 worldwide, with a $936,170 domestic opening across 1,041 theatres. [Box Office Mojo]
4. Liam Neeson was born on 7 June 1952 (age 73), which makes any “early 00s” flashback feel like the film is daring you to do subtraction in public. [Britannica] [Guardian]

The sketch

Scene 1: “This shit is real”
A government briefing room. A huge screen reads: “PAY ATTENTION.” A junior analyst raises a hand while everyone else stares at mould.
Analyst: “So… what year are we in?”
Officer: “All of them. Labelled. Relax.”

Scene 2: “Hazmat TikTok”
Inside the facility, two workers in masks. The camera suddenly snaps into helmet-cam mode like it is proud of itself.
Worker 1: “Why is my view stuck to my forehead?”
Worker 2: “Because cinema is art. Also, battery is at 2 per cent.”

Scene 3: “Cinema shrinkage”
A cinema auditorium. The screen looks suspiciously like a living room. A poster screams “BIG SCREEN EVENT”.
Customer: “Why does this feel like my sofa, but louder?”
Manager: “It’s premium. We added adverts.”

What to watch, not the show

• Cost-cutting logic: spend on cast, save on anything that would make time-jumps believable.
• The “found footage” itch: a trendy camera gimmick can replace a proper scare beat, if you are lazy.
• Cinema stagnation: standard screens and sound do not feel special anymore, so the room has to sell nostalgia.
• Streaming gravity: audiences now compare every cinema trip to “I could watch this at home tonight”.
• The real monster is incentives: the fungus is just doing what the business model taught it.

The Hermit take

Clear timelines and solid genre fun.
But if you time-stamp the past, you cannot outsource ageing to audience denial.

Keep or toss

Keep / Toss.
Keep the clean time jumps, the pace, and Neeson’s dependable steel.
Toss the pointless hazmat-cam moments and the “flashbacks without younger faces” bargain.

Sources

• The Guardian review (UK release date, plot beats, style notes): https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/feb/20/cold-storage-review-mutant-mildew-plague-horror-comedy-stuffs-fun-into-the-fungi
• Rotten Tomatoes (runtime, rating, synopsis, credits basics): https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/cold_storage_2026
• Box Office Mojo (box office totals, opening, theatres): https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt8879928/
• Encyclopaedia Britannica (Liam Neeson birth date and age): https://www.britannica.com/facts/Liam-Neeson
• NME (composer credit for score): https://www.nme.com/news/film/cold-storage-soundtrack-every-song-3929807
• Cold Storage IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8879928/