[1][2] The film stars Martin Freeman, Simone Landers, Anthony Hayes, David Gulpilil, Susie Porter, and Caren Pistorius.

[4] In a world recently overtaken by a virus that turns people rabid within 48 hours, Andy Rose, his wife Kay, and their baby Rosie are traveling down a river on a houseboat in rural Australia.

Short on food, Kay suggests going ashore and scavenging, but Andy rejects this, arguing it would be safer to remain on the river until they reach their destination, a supposed refuge.

The next day, Andy searches an abandoned sailboat and retrieves some supplies, but when Kay ventures out to collect more, she is bitten by a rabid human.

Andy finds Kay trying to bandage the bite wound and insists on taking her to a hospital since she would bleed out long before succumbing to the virus.

The Rose family disembarks, restarts an abandoned car, and sets out toward what their map indicates is a large town, but they swerve to avoid an Aboriginal man wearing a mouth gag standing in the road and crash.

Etta explains that all of her students and their families, most of them Aboriginals, have discarded modern trappings and gone back to the old ways; she warns Andy to hide his bite mark.

[6][7][8][9] The film is dedicated in memory of Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu, an Aboriginal Australian singer who died aged 46 on 26 July 2017.

The website's critical consensus reads, "Cargo takes a refreshingly character-driven approach to the zombie genre that's further distinguished by its Australian setting and Martin Freeman's terrific lead performance.

[13] Clark Collins of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a 'B', saying: "The Australian setting brings a fresh, and epic, quality to this now done-to-death genre".

[14] However, Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter criticised the film for being "unlikely to satisfy either viewers looking for serious-minded fare or horror fans looking for genuine frights", but praised Freeman's "quietly intense" performance.