Project Viper

I don't remember much of this movie, since I was watching it on vacation in Greece at like 3:00 in the morning. The fact that I couldn't bring myself to finish it even though it was the only English-language program on should tell you a lot right there. I do remember a lot of shockingly bad camera-work, editing, and acting... camera-work especially. It honestly looks like they gave the camera to a 6 year old and told him to follow the adults around. I remember in particular a chase scene through a hallway where the camera-work is so bad the characters aren't even in the frame half the time (this same chase scene, incidentally, is a good example of the awfulness of the plot, since it's started when a lady walks right up in plain view of a guy she's trying to spy on, then defends herself by saying she was "going for a walk." Hmm, yeah, I spend a lot of time going for walks in my living room too).

If the choreography isn't bad enough for you, there's also the lighting coming from bizarre angles in places where there shouldn't be any light, the cartoon CGI tentacles that pass for a monster, etc. As a movie, it's really boring, but it's a great example of not NOT to direct. If you are an aspiring director and want to improve, my advice is watch this movie. You could sit there for hours and take notes of what the director is doing wrong.

You could use the same technique to brush up on your acting skills. The actors here are vomit-inducingly awful. All of them just seem bored (understandably), even when something bad is supposedly happening to them, like tentacles going into their mouths and coming out their stomachs (by the way, user Billy Lovelady's comment about "tentacle hentai" is one of the funniest things I've ever read. Thank you, sir). Some of them are also plain weird, like the crazy hick neighbor and the sheriff who looks like Freddie Mercury at age 70.

Unless you're using this for study as I've suggested, avoid it at all costs. It's mindless and boring. There are millions of better things to do than watch this movie, such as looking out the window, which is what I did for the next hour after I turned it off. It was a hell of a lot more productive than waiting to see who killed the Viper.

The start isn't bad, but after the end you will find that this film has only two good things to offer: Theresa Russel and the musical score, (that is clearly cloned from the music of the memorable Ridley Scott's "Alien"). The remaining is the usual dull stuff. I found annoying the male protagonist that, in a story supposed to be serious, is acting like he was in a James Bond movie, with the difference that here the jokes appear to be really misplaced.

A movie to watch with an eye only, while you are doing something else.

4/10

Project Viper could have been much worse than it was, and there have been both worse and better movies. There are redeeming qualities certainly. Theresa Russell does bring some charisma and grit to her femme-fatale sort of role as well as showing beautiful looks. The music doesn't really sound all that original, I agree that it was reminiscent of Alien, but it was memorable, it was haunting and it was suspenseful(a shame that the movie didn't live up to it). A couple of effects are decent, though both are crude and bizarre looking, but the ones in the opening scene and the viper chasing the jeep through the caves were not bad at all. However, I never found Project Viper thrilling or really all that unsettling either. The very derivative(there are scenes that do look as though they were lifted out of better stuff like It, Air America and Species) and disjointed storytelling, the talky and overly-serious in tone scripting, the laborious pacing, the clichéd and underdeveloped characters and haphazard filming really undermined any atmosphere Project Viper could have had that the music promised. Apart from Russell the acting is not great at all. Tim Thomerson is not too bad actually but is saddled with a stereotyped sheriff character that you just don't care for at the end of the day. Patrick Muldoon is the worst, he manages to be both annoying and bland. All in all, has its redeeming qualities but didn't do all that much for me. 3/10 Bethany Cox

The title sequence features a space shuttle out in deep space which instantly reminded me of LIFEFORCE while the music used reminded me of ALIENS ( As one commentator suggested on this page it might actually be the soundtrack itself ) and all the way through PROJECT VIPER I couldn`t help but be reminded of set pieces I`d seen from other movies , but things go from bad to worse when an entire sequence is lifted from SPECIES , let me clarify that , the sequence didn`t remind me of SPECIES , it was stolen from the film itself and a couple of minutes later there`s another sequence stolen from AIR AMERICA ! I`ve said this before and I`ve saying it again : If you can`t make your own movie , then don`t bother making a movie . On top of all that because PROJECT VIPER uses action scenes from other peoples films the screenplay is very confused and disjointed

Haha, I remember watching this movie not once but twice. Okay, with a considerable amount of time in between, I admit. I might be a fan of Jim Wynorski, it's not like I'm going to allow him frying my brain by watching his movies over and over again. And no, I'm not nuts for rating this 5/10. Just keep in mind that these are Wynorski-ratings and not average movie ratings. But still, this is more or less one of his better accomplished efforts. Believe me, he can do a lot worse. A whole lot worse. The opening-credits (especially the musical score) even seem to promise that you just might be entering the latest cash-in on "Alien" or something. Really, I kid you not! Decent score that echoes Jerry Goldsmith's work for Ridley Scott's film. Fancy outer-space effects. But as soon as the interior shots of the space-shuttle come on and the, uhm, actors do their thing, then you know you just entered Wynorski-territory. The creature itself looks like a gray CGI-blob with snappy teeth, tentacles and morphing skills. Pretty uninspired, I'd say. But still, the effects, and the whole movie for that matter, looked pretty much okay (once again: don't forget that this still is a Wynorski-flick). Tim Thomerson is fun as always. Patrick Muldoon isn't even trying, not by a long shot. And Theresa Russell... well, I like the lady, so not a bad word about her please. But what the hell was she doing in this movie? Oh, well, I'll forgive her, as always. And I'll probably even watch "Project Viper" again, some day, because of her being in it. Theresa Russel makes me watch bad movies. Just like Rutger Hauer does. Like I said, I forgive both of them for this.