Cronenberg has stated that he originally wanted to cast Sissy Spacek in the lead, but the studio vetoed this because of her accent. Ironically enough, Spacek’s film Carrie was released and proved to be a massive hit during this film’s production. The director says that the idea of casting Chambers originated with producer Ivan Reitman, because he had heard that Chambers was looking for a mainstream role and because he felt that it would be easier to market the film in different territories if the well-known porn star portrayed the main character. Nevertheless, Cronenberg stated that Chambers worked very hard on the film and that he was impressed with her.

A critically-injured woman, victim of a motorcycle accident, is taken to the plastic surgery clinic of Doctor Dan Keloid, where some of her intact tissue is treated to become “morphogenetically neutral” and grafted to fire-damaged areas of her body in the hope that they will differentiate and replace the damaged skin and organs.

Unfortunately, the woman’s body unexpectedly accepts the transplants: she develops an anal orifice under an armpit, within it hides a phallic stinger. She uses it to feed on the blood of other people, and afterwards wiping their memories of their incidents with her.

It soon is apparent that her every victim transforms to a rabid zombie whose bite spreads the disease, eventually causing the city to fall into chaos before the outbreak can be contained.