Airdate: Panic at Rock Island

Nine’s telemovie about a flesh-eating virus breaking out during a Sydney rock concert will premiere Sunday week.

Panic at Rock Island will screen at 8:30pm Sunday July 24th on Nine -which means Underbelly: Razor remains a hot tip for Sunday July 31st (to be confirmed).

The telemovie has already screened in New Zealand, as a co-production with TVNZ partly. The cast includes Grant Bowler, Vince Colosimo, Damian Walshe-Howling, Dee Smart, Jessica Tovey Simone Kessell, and Anna Hutchison. It was produced by Goalpost Pictures.

Grant Bowler stars as Jim Quinn, the determined Chief Medical Examiner frustrated that government authorities won’t take his warnings of an outbreak of a deadly virus seriously.Vince Colosimo co-stars as the charismatic Hirsch, a heavyweight government spook who sides with Quinn to try and prevent a disaster.

On the eve of the biggest live music party staged on Rock Island in Sydney every year, a body is discovered, ravaged by a mysterious contagion. Chief Medical Examiner Quinn immediately appeals for quarantine but the party is too important to the city’s coffers to be cancelled. Quinn’s fears spiral out of control when he learns that his children Elmo (Christian Byers) and Nina, a police constable (Jessica Tovey), are both at the party.

With the help of Hirsch (Colosimo), Quinn takes the law into his own hands and closes off all access to the event. But instead of controlling the situation, a riot erupts that throws the entire city into bedlam. With his world collapsing around him, Quinn discovers that not only has his wife Denny (Dee Smart) infiltrated the deadly pandemonium to find their two children, but the virus is no accident – and the people responsible for it are the last ones he would ever suspect.

Panic at Rock Island also stars Damian Walshe-Howling as Rufus Mitchell, a senior member of an emergency response team and the first doctor to arrive on Rock Island after the virus is discovered. Anna Hutchison plays the eccentric popular culture personality VJ Pilly, Simone Kessell is Louise Olsson, a highly competent and conscientious member of the disease forensics division of the Police Force, and Nathan Page plays Matthew Cross, a former Special Ops expert who has a very big beef with the government and the military.

Directed by Tony Tilse, Panic at Rock Island is a Goalpost Pictures Australia and Gibson Group production for the Nine Network.

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