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    Species

    Reviewed by
    adamwatchesmovies@

    WARNING: This review is hidden because it reveals the content of the film.
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    "Species" is little more than an excuse to have Natasha Henstridge appear topless between scenes of alien special effects.

    Scientists have succeeded in combining human and alien DNA, and the result is the beautiful Sil (Natasha Henstridge.) When her violent behaviour leads government scientist Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley) to try and destroy the hybrid, she manages to escape. A team of specialists including anthropologist Dr. Stephen Arden (Alfred Molina), molecular biologist Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger), mercenary/bounty hunter Preston Lennox (Michael Madsen) and empathy Dan Smiths Forest Whitaker, whose character I’ll get to in a moment) have to track down and destroy Sil before she mates and unleashes a new species of ¼ alien hybrids that will destroy the human race!

    The whole movie feels like a giant tease and is often lazily plotted. Forest Whitaker’s Dan Smithson is a man who has psychic powers that allow him to sense other's feelings and sense where people (or in this case where a half-people) have gone. Sounds promising, right? Perhaps there will be inner conflict within the team when he begins to sympathize with the creature. It wouldn’t be too outlandish. Sil’s never had any human contact and was raised in a glass cage so it's never experienced love or even friendship. Maybe he’ll be able to somehow reach out to the creature and understand why it's running around confused and scared. This kind of thinking will only raise your hopes uselessly. Dan’s psychic abilities aren’t there to add drama or interest to the film, they're included so he can point our heroes in the right direction whenever they lose track of Sil. There's not a lot of detective work in the movie, people just "know" where their target is heading so they follow her around, always coming into the area a few minutes too late.

    The reason the movie feels like a big tease is because it often repeats itself. The creature is on the run, finds a man to mate with, Natasha Henstridge takes off some or all of her clothes, something interrupts them and she kills someone. The team tracking her down arrive just as she's leaving, they determine that she hasn't had time to copulate yet and we start over. The subtitle to species should be "You’ve never had a pregnancy scare like this one!". The plot is very silly and full of plot holes so it would be perfectly appropriate to have such a bad line adorn the poster/DVD cover. Why, for example, would the government gets a whopping 4 people to track down the super secretive alien/human hybrid? Yes, there's reason for secrecy but once the creature has murdered someone, wouldn't you at least inform the police and tell them that she’s I dunno, a Russian spy, a paid assassin out to kill the president, some kind of genetic super-soldier? At the very least don’t cover anything up and let everyone within 200 kilometers know that there's a woman on the run who's murdered at least one person and needs to be caught.

    You might argue that the movie gives a reason why the police aren't informed. The team tracking Sil aren't able to get a clear picture of her fully formed, woman state. It’s true, but these reason are incredibly contrived and don't make sense under a bit of scrutiny. At first, the team is able to find some security tape footage, but the angle is bad so you're not able to see the woman's face. Ok, sure but what about the clerk at the counter? Shouldn’t he able to give them a description of the woman and help the police put together a sketch? How stupid does the director think the audience is when later in the film, Sil gets her picture taken and it turns out blurry. Normally, it would be the last bit our heroes would need to save the day, but it’s a Friday the 13th set on the same day as Hallowe’en, there’s a solar eclipse and all of the planets have aligned in Sil’s favour. Either that or the photographer didn’t care that his photo sucked, he used up the very last bit of film, or he didn’t realize that a Polaroid allows you to see what picture you took immediately, meaning he could have looked at what he shot and taken another good one. Then again, we’re talking about a man who doesn’t understand Sil’s intentions when she takes off all of her clothes and starts kissing him in the hot tub, so maybe he’s just that dumb.

    Aside from their logical blunders, the main human characters are actually decently fleshed out and fun to follow. You can actually see the relationship between the teammates develop as they get closer to the hybrid and the actors are charismatic. On their own or as individuals they’re fun. I also enjoyed Sil’s scenes. Sure it’s often due to Natasha Henstridge’s looks, and the fact that you get to see a whole lot of her skin throughout, but that’s why the cast her in the role so I think it’s legitimate. When we finally see her full "alien" mode, the design by H. R. Giger is interesting, even if some of the design choices are quite puzzling (was there really a reason for the creature to have tentacles coming out of her nipples? Well, maybe it's an irony thing.)

    The climax feels more forced than Ripley’s horrific human/alien hybrid baby through a small hole in the hull of a spaceship and has the semi-competent characters making loads of bone-headed decisions only so they can be put in some additional danger. We get some truly abysmal dialogue as well. It becomes downright hilarious as you hear our heroes utter "She was half us, half something else, I wonder which was the predatory half? " "The dead half". It’s a blast of silly science fiction that feels reminiscent of many other, better titles. It isn't all bad but there are so many ludicrous or plain brain-dead parts in it that "Species" works better as a movie you can just turn off your brain and laugh at from time to time than as a story with any genuine thrills or scares. I do have to give the film credit for swapping the ol’ screeching cat with a squirrel for its cheap startle though. “Species” is cheap titillation with some alien mumbo jumbo thrown in. A film that’s not all bad, but more often "so bad it's good" than legitimately successful. (On Dvd, May 31, 2013)

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    adamwatchesmovies@  4.5.2016 age: 26-35 2,866 reviews

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