Peur panique

A 'Wes Craven presents' movie from 1995, directed by Joe Clayton and starring Lance Henriksen. A group of scientists save a dying man they find by their desert stranded government outpost by injecting him with their experimental virus, of course, one of their colleagues goes overboard and the virus transforms the man into a near unstoppable monster with them trapped inside. Lance Henriksen plays the morally offended researcher who leaves the project before all this, but returns after receiving a call for help to save the man (pre-unstoppable death machine mutation).

Deciding to combine two trips in one he brings his family along with him (they're going on vacation afterwards) and proceeds to give them entry to the top secret government facility, thus putting them right in the middle of the chaos within. In case you can't tell, this one relies on the viewer to work with it a little and put aside some petty (see: major and blatant) details.

Overall though: Watch-able with mild bits of enjoyment. Note: The Outpost is commonly known under the title 'Mind Ripper'

I just bought this as part of a Wes Craven DVD box set (along with Scream, The Hills Have Eyes, and The Last House on the Left) and felt ever so slightly conned. The film is not directed by Wes Craven (he has an executive producer credit) and a dream box set would omit this sci-fi B-movie in favour of Nightmare on Elm Street (I would settle for The People Under the Stairs).

With that being said, this is an ideal film for watching with a gang of drunk mates after a night in the pub. It's a creature feature in a remote claustrophobic environment and it ticks along quite nicely on a sub-Alien template, taking advantage of all the usual sci-fi horror clichés. The monster is cheap but effective and it is sympathetically played. The rest of the characters are just monster fodder and are badly underwritten, though a father-son theme breaks through to complement the monster-creator theme. Lance Henrikson, the brunette girl in the shower, and the bloke who plays Phoebe's brother in Friends are worth watching. The rest of the cast stink. There are enough gruesome moments to keep a drunken audience's interest. It's also fun ticking off the clichés as they mount up, and laughing at the obvious dialogue. I defy anyone (after a few drinks) not to laugh at the last scene.

So not a classic sci-fi horror, but an entertaining mess of a movie with redeeming qualities, best viewed with friends and alcohol.

This film is a bit of a tough watch. It has a decent cast, alright cinematography and some worthy practical effects, but the screenplay just doesn't work, and the director probably had a hard time since the writer is the producer. I know this was initially written as The Hills Have Eyes Part III, I think that script would have been better. There's a lot of references from great films, for instance the antagonist feels like a human version of a xenomorph, which in a way works. There's a line I find funny - the brother says to his sister's boyfriend "You couldn't get a piece of ass if you were a toilet seat". Bro, he's bangin' your sister lol.

Sigh…the stupid government once again attempted to create an inexhaustible and indestructible soldier, and of course the experiments went terribly wrong, burdening us with a half man-half mutant who pukes an awful lot and squeaks like a little girl whenever he's upset. Lance Henriksen stars as the honest scientist who immediately quit the experiment upon hearing it was a military project, but he returns (bringing the whole family with him) when he finds out his beloved guinea pig has gone on a killing spree. "Mind Ripper" certainly is a watchable horror movie, but it's very unoriginal and features pretty much every lame cliché you can think off (including the estranged father/rebellious teenage son sub plot...yawn). The characters are like wooden puppets, the dumbest things are being said and done and there's a completely pointless dream-sequence...coming from the monster!!! There's a handful of interesting gory scenes to enjoy and some of the isolated desert-locations are effectively eerie. Lance Henriksen is adequate as always, even though this is yet another inferior production he stars, and Giovanni Ribisi surely deserved a better motion picture to make his debut in. For some reason, this anonymous 90's thriller is also known as "The Hills Have Eyes part 3". Is it because it handles about members of the same family being terrorized in the desert? Is it because Wes Craven was once again involved, as a producer this time? Or maybe it's because the monster gets bald near the end like the freaky Michael Berryman in the 1977 original? Who knows...Who cares? Wes Craven probably financed this project because his son co-wrote the script and it's always moving to discover that your offspring is equally untalented as you are. Not recommended!

Back in the day when I first saw this movie I remember loving it. I've watched it several more times over the years and still enjoy it probably because of the nostalgia.

Does it have good acting? Not really. Is the script amazing? No I can't say it is.

There's questionable choices by characters and plot holes a plenty but I still enjoy it.

Possibly it could be good for fans of low budget scifi horror. It has good camera work and makeup. Giovanni Ribissi stands out as the best acting and Lance Henrikson is in it so good for "Aliens" and "Pumkinhead" fans.