Amazon.com video review:
In this fast-paced, sci-fi/horror shoot-'em-up based on the Dark
Horse
comic book,
Jamie Lee Curtis plays the navigator of an ocean-going tug. When a typhoon
cripples their boat, the crew
sails into the eye of the storm, where they discover a high-tech Russian
communications and research vessel adrift. Only one Russian crewmember is
still alive, raving about "intelligent lightning." They soon discover that
an alien life form has taken over the ship's computers and is churning out
biomechanical warriors. With their own boat destroyed, the crew must battle
the creature as the ship reenters the storm. If the basic story and
characters all sound familiar, it may not surprise you that producer Gale
Anne Hurd's other films include The Terminator and Aliens. This
movie and its derivative screenplay aren't nearly as good as those were,
and director John Bruno (who won
an Oscar for best visual effects for The Abyss) seems more skilled
at action choreography and special effects than character and story.
Curtis
plays another variation on her "scream queen" persona, while Donald
Sutherland
gives a deliciously hammy performance as the tug captain (in his words,
"the
dominant life form") who smells salvage money if he can claim the Russian
ship for his own. For all the picture's flaws, the effects are good (and gory)
and it moves at top speed for a brisk 100 minutes. A trivia factoid:
at one point on this troubled production, film footage was seized at the
airport because the shipping box was prominently marked with the film's
title! --Geof Miller
