The Infection in film

The Infection (under the original lineup of SpongeBob SquarePants, Sandy Cheeks and Patrick Star), were an alternative rock-grunge band from San Diego. Between 1994 and 2005, they appeared in eight major motion pictures, beginning with ***Sway*** (1994) and ending with ***Dead Moon Circus*** (2005), with most of them including SpongeBob and Sandy.

## Films starring the Infection

##### ***Sway (1994)***

Released by Warner Bros. Pictures as a mockumentary musical coming-of-age film at the height of the band's growing popularity on July 19th, 1994, the three members travel to Salem, Massachusetts for a week-long holiday to record new songs, only to discover that the townspeople there suspects them of being involved in witchcraft. The film was an enormous success at the box office, with the soundtrack selling over 12 million copies.

#### ***Stealing Beauty (1996)***

***Stealing Beauty*** was the band's second major film, released by Searchlight Pictures on June 14th, 1996. It follows Sandy Cheeks' character (Lucy Harmon) traveling to Italy, as she searches for a deeper connection and true love with SpongeBob SquarePants' character (Christopher Fox). Upon the film's original release, it received mixed reviews from critics but later achieved cult status and has been singled out as one of the films that captured the zeitgeist of the early 1990s grunge scene among young adults.

In addition, SpongeBob's cover of The Cure's "A Night Like This", and a re-recorded version of "Anything, Anything" would both be added to the movie's soundtrack.

#### ***Traffic Jam: Fight to Survive (1998)***

A month after the success of the 2nd studio album ***Traffic Jam***, the band's third major film released via Warner Bros. Pictures on April 15th, 1998. It starred the band with Steve Burns, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Keanu Reeves and Gwen Stefani. The film's plot centered around a fictional version of The Infection as spies in a utopian virtual reality game designed for a possible Nuclear Winter event.

Like ***Sway,*** the group performs several songs in the film that appear on their soundtrack album of the same name. The film's virtual reality scenes were filmed at Universal Studios with the assistance of Industrial Light & Magic. Upon release, it released critical acclaim for its story, characters and usage of CGI. In addition, the film grossed over $423.8 million, making it the 3rd highest-grossing film of 1998.

#### ***The Disparate Realms of the Multiverse*** ***(2000)***

***The Disparate Realms of the Multiverse*** was the band's fourth major film. Unlike the 1994 and 1998 releases, the film was released by Twentieth Century Fox on June 5th, 2000 and starred the band with David Duchovny, Sarah Silverman, Zooey Deschanel, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tom Kenny, Grey DeLisle and Rodger Bumpass. Its plot focuses on a fictitious story about The Infection's origins, and their journey to battle a evil emperor that has plans to destroy alternative rock music with a supercomputer.

Upon the films release, it was greeted with positive reviews but was not as well-received as ***Traffic Jam: Fight to Survive.*** Nevertheless, the film is retrospectively regarded as being very influential and a cult classic.

#### ***Dead Moon Circus (2005)***

Bouncing back from the box office failure ***Antitrust***, the band's final major feature film based on ***The Anime Album***, released on June 14th, 2005 by Twentieth Century Fox, was a parody of the *Power Rangers* franchise and focused on the band teaming up to take on a space alien that plans on destroying Earth.

## Critical reception

* Sway (1994) - 88% [Rotten Tomatoes]
* Stealing Beauty (1996) - 50% [Rotten Tomatoes]
* Traffic Jam: Fight to Survive (1998) - 100% [Rotten Tomatoes]
* The Disparate Realms of the Multiverse (2000) - 84% [Rotten Tomatoes]
* Antitrust (2001) - 24% [Rotten Tomatoes]
* Dead Moon Circus (2005) - 91% [Rotten Tomatoes]