Review of Species (1995) by Peter H — 14 May 2011

SPECIES [1995] As a cult movie buff , I just happen to feel the need for once in a while to set my sights upon the wide world of the Cult film genre. And I enjoy all Cult movies brilliant and bad so today I felt like lowering my sights low upon a trashy Cult film saga. The cult movie saga I'm going to look into is a Sic-Fi/Horror saga from the mid 1990's and mid 2000's that's basic premise sounds so rubbish not even in the heyday of the 1950's B-grade Sic-Fi would sink that low. I'm of course talking about the SPECIES series which had the first film which spawned two sequels and one follow on film that has little to connect it with the first three films. So since the urge to view and review something worthy of the MST3K treatment was SO over powering [much like this films Alien's urge to mate] and seeing the entire series in a multi box DVD set at my local store I thought hell just dive right into it and regret the possible mind numbing feeling that would most likely follow.

After that entire can do- and-regret-it attitude has REALLY harmed me in the past with the mistake of seeing ultra bad Cult films like MONSTER A GO-GO [1961&1965] and more recently SANTA AND THE ICE CREAM BUNNY [1972]. So let's just see dear reader if any one of the SPECIES films can anger me worse that those two films that are worse than the spawn of the devil. The first film in this four day marathon review series of series that has a title that rhymes with Faeces (sorry to include a bit of high brow toilet humour as well) let's just dive right into the SPECIES saga. So over the course of the next four days I will be posting a review of one of the four SPEICES films starting with the original 1995 film SPECIES which kick started another saga that didn't have much hope of being something other than an average Sic-Fi/Horror film.

DAY ONE: SPECIES [1995] so were to begin with this one? Should I just cut right to the chase and just say it's just downright average? SPECIES is a typical Alien film combined with your run of the mill 1980's& 1990's action film that seems to owe a lot to great sci-fi horror films like ALIEN and THE THING. Aside for being a possible rip-off of those two films and being an average film how can I really comment on a film I had no hope in the first place. Well I must confess SPECIES blends mind numbing action with a fair bit female nudity, soft-core sex scenes and gore that oh hell is rather mildly entertaining to view.

THE PLOTLINE.

When the U.S government breeds a half human -Alien after being beamed the DNA information from the alien race, typical trouble insures. The 12 year old human-Alien girl called Sil escapes from the lab, the Government gathers a group of professionals to track down Sil. The team consists of an assassin called Preston Lenox (Michael Madsen) a Psychic/ Mystic called Dan (Forrest Whitaker), a female scientist and another sort of scientist. But when Sil turns into an adult woman (Natasha Henstridge) and arrives in L.A, she starts to develop the urge to mate with any man to have a child. So it's up to Preston and co to kill the Alien Sil after the government was stupid enough to breed a bloody alien in a human body.

THE ACTING, DIRECTION, CINEMA PHOTOGRAPHY AND SFX.

What can I say about the performances in this film? Natasha Henstridge as Sil give an ok performance that could be viewed as wooden but thanks to her character being written as a 2-demisonal nymphomaniac driven alien-woman makes it hard for me to comment on. Thankfully she doesn't come across as annoying but more as a piece of eye candy for the target audience males aged 15-25. What makes me to believe this? Well Natasha is a stunning blonde bombshell who gets naked more than 5 times and whose character is driven by the urge for sex, much like EVERY blonde woman in a sexploitation film and porno.

With Michael Madsen well hell he is enjoyable to view even though he is working with rubbish and non-Quentin Tarantino material. And finally with Forrest Whitaker as Dan, I get the impression he took this role way to seriously which makes his enjoyable performance comes across as slightly comical. At least it's no way near as bad as his carrier ruining performance in BATTLEFIELD EARTH as one of those weird Rasta-Aliens called Psycho's (at least that's what I think they are called).

With the direction and cinema-photography well much like the rest of the film it's just dirt average, no real moment sticks out in my mind aside for Michael Madsen, Forrest Whitaker, the nymphomaniac alien and the creature design by H.R. Giger , hang on is that the same H.R. Giger responsible for the aliens in the ALIEN franchise ? Yes it is and the look to the SPEICES creature has the vague look to it that resembles the Aliens in the ALIEN series. Seriously aside from the awful CGI of the creature in parts that creature looks amazing, more impressive is the Species train in the human Sil's nightmare.

So overall how did I find the first film in the four movie SPEICIES series? SPIECES is a mildly amusing film for its gore, soft-core sex scenes, the silly idea of a nymphomaniac alien, the average performances by Madsen and Whitaker and the Amazing creature design by H.R Giger the original SPIECES comes across as a neat but silly piece of 1990's Sic-Fi trash. My rating for the first SPECIES film is a solid 60%, now that's covered one down and three more films to view and review.