Andrew - MAJOR SPOILERS

I knew the family would be killed from the beginning

The horror movies with no children dying tend to annoy me. I mean sure when its happening in a place where there are no children, fine, but when children are present and somehow magically none of them get hurt (which we know is intentional not to upset the sensitive viewers) yeah its bugs me. I like it when the makers dare to go there.

This is not a horror film. Its far too boring and far too little happened to label it that. There are so many problems with this but one of the big ones is we don't know who made who sick in the end. Nor do we know anything about the plague itself to even come to the conclusion that only contact with the infected can make you sick.

I know what you mean. I didn't get as strong reactions as you from the act of killing the boy, but I felt a similar way about a movie I saw in the mid-90s called Heavenly Creatures where a girl kills her mother with a brick to the head. It was a sick disturbing scene and I never have any intentions of rewatching that, although it's still embedded in my mind.

Anyway, I think the ICAN scene would've invoked a stronger feeling if we had have known absolutely at that point that Travis was sick, and that Andrew was fine. The viewer, being tricked into thinking that Andrew was sick, might have justified his shooting as a quick death in the face of the inevitable. But it's ambiguous and I think a bit of a cop out as a it doesn't invoke as much of a set of strong feelings of injustice and horror as it could've.

My interpretation is that Andrew was sick and infected Travis. The reasons I think this are because of the conversation Travis overheard between Will and Kim about Paul and Sarah hearing Andrew's moans and crying (due to him suffering) and the fact that Will made a point several times to tell Andrew to keep his eyes shut when he had Paul at gunpoint. At first I thought he just did not want Andrew to see him shoot Paul, but I now think he did not want Paul to see that Andrew's eyes were black due to the sickness. If he were not sick it would have been easy enough to prove, just let Paul have a look at him while he had the gun on him. Show Paul that his eyes are not black and he's not puking up motor oil. He was sick and Will (correctly) thought if he let Paul see that Paul would kill him without thinking twice.

Yes it is a very said scene, but the kid was indeed sick. That's why they knew they had to leave.

But Andrew WAS sick AND infected Travis. He was already dead (if anything, I'd argue it was an accidental mercy killing on Paul's part). I too entertained the idea of Travis being the first to catch the sickness (remember his recurring insomnia? Maybe HE did the sleepwalking and found Stanley before waking up and stumbling upon Andrew.), but it makes no sense Andrew's manifested symptoms before him.

TL;DR Andrew was sick, that much we know. That's why both his parents keep blocking him out of view and were so eager to leave.

I wholeheartedly agree with you. This film had an inevitable plot and a devastating conclusion. The first movie I saw where both sides were actually good guys fighting each other to save their loved ones. In the end, Paul's family unfortunately succeeds. And the paralyzing ending.....watching that mother scream and cry as her son is killed right in front of her. I don't think I can ever get that scene off my soul. I don't think any mother should ever watch this.