Warning Sign is a 1985 film directed by Hal Barwood and starring Sam Waterston, Kathleen Quinlan, Yaphet Kotto, and Jeffrey DeMunn.
The accidental release of a deadly biological weapon in a secret government laboratory masquerading as a pesticide research facility results in a lockdown of the facility. The government sends an inoculated team in to rescue uninfected workers, and to inoculate the infected. Unfortunately, once they're in, they learn that the virus causes homicidal behavior within the infected while leaving them lucid enough to plan ambushes. And neither the inoculation nor the antidote actually works...
This film exhibits the following tropes:
- Artifact Title: Reversed. The movie poster, also used as the cover for the home release, has a biohazard symbol as the only recognizable imagery, owing to when Biohazard was the planned title of the film.
- Hate Plague: The virus, synthesized from analysis of a herd of horses that had kicked each other to death, induces homicidal rage in the subjects without removing their intellectual faculties.
- The Immune: Joanie is revealed to be immune to the virus, with the explanation being that her pregnancy has flooded her body with hormones that prevent the disease from taking root.
- Indy Hat Roll: Dana performs a slide under a closing security bulkhead to get out before the lockdown is complete, resulting in her being among the three workers quarantined in plastic bubbles outside.
- Lockdown: When the virus is released, Joanie Morse, the plant's security officer, enacts "Protocol One," which locks down the building, preventing anyone from exiting until they are provided with the antidote. This is later upgraded to "Protocol Two," to keep the building locked down until all inside are deceased, after the death of the Rescue Team shows that the antidote does not work.
- Trapped in Containment: Several workers, including the trio of Bob, Schmidt, and Tippett, believe themselves to be uninfected, and are trying to escape by whatever means possible. Unfortunately, they are wrong about being uninfected.
