What has happened to the career of Christian Slater, a reasonably talented actor who has made some good movies? In his latest role, the cheesy, derivative B-level sci-fi-horror, Slatere plays Gerard Brauchman, a colonel heading a small crew that’s cut off from Earth with their life support failing.
The shapeless narrative is not just shallow but empty and uninvoliving. It’s like a series of scenes (none particularly engaging) thrown together so that they form a feature-length story.
We learn that the isolated U.S. military moonbase has been bombarded by a rogue meteor storm, and that the meteors harbored alien spores that are replicating rapidly.
We have all seen this kind of tale, crisis situation, and characters before–and in better movies. In this pale imitation of other generic items, the vicious, shape-shifting predatory life form is loose inside the crippled facility, picking off victims randomly, one by one.
In a desperate fight for survival, Brauchman and the terrified remaining astronauts realize that the only viable mission is to keep the creature from escaping the moon.
The technical execution is inept, and by today’s standards, the picture doesn’t look good. This may be a function of the low budget and/or lack of knowledge on the part of the filmmakers, especially directed Roger Christian.
Fortunately, the movie is only 87 minute long, but you will feel each one of them due to the vapid tale and the deliberate tempo.