Screamers: A Caçada

Take a look at the picture of the cover, as posted on IMDb. Note the rather generic and jaded design, and note that significant elements of the scary imagery seem to be lifted from other well known horror/science-fiction films. If you accept that the cover does in fact reveal the quality of the film, then you will have little reason to be disappointed.

This movie has a serious case of 'sequel-itis', and many of the outstanding points in the original from (some of) the acting, to the costumes, are seriously degraded, but nonetheless, the overall result is of sturdy B-movie grade. Most elements, from plot to acting are 'bad' in the sense that they are liable to be rated rather low in comparison to many other films you might have seen, but they are not generally provokingly bad in and of themselves.

The simplest way of judging whether you should see Screamers: the Hunting if you are interested in the genre and intrigued by the synopsis, would be to ask whether or not you are angered by all mediocrity in movies. If so, avoid. If you can be more tolerant and watch with appropriately restrained expectations, the movie is okay.

Y'know that feeling you get whenever you've mostly liked an original movie but knew where it messed up, then you catch yourself hoping the sequel will be better than the first film because they must've have learned what not to do?

But then the sequel is actually worse than the first because the new filmmaker learned nothing? Suddenly your bring home the corpse of a squirrel because it was looking at your gold? But you don't have any gold? And you're not prospecting?

It's probably just your mind protecting itself from more harm. Alcohol can help but you're just masking the movie. It's traumatic.

I caught the first "Screamers" in the theater and enjoyed the heck out of it. Director Christian Duguay had the foresight to use some decent actors (Peter Weller chiefly among them), paid attention to fashioning a politically charged story and did his best to deliver a decent film. Hey, it wasn't perfect, but he succeeded more than not.

Now comes Sheldon Wilson who tries to make up for a ridiculous story with some interesting visuals. If you give bad actors some good dialogue or even good actors some bad dialogue, you sometimes get lucky. However, when you give bad actors some bad dialogue, riddle a plot with inconsistencies, gaping holes and a lack of any logic while making it all extremely easy to pick out every twist and turn to come, then you get "Screamers: The Hunting".

Things are still bad on Sirius 6B and when a distress signal is sent to Earth, the Alliance dispatches a few 20-somethings to seek out any survivors and bring them back home. Speeding their efforts is some sort of super storm that's going to wipe out all life on the planet, giving them a couple of days to complete their mission.

Along the way they'll meander around, discover some survivors, run, discover that Screamers have gotten aboard their ship (how, exactly, is never disclosed), run back to the survivors, get the majority of the survivors slaughtered, leave with someone meant to be a red herring (right), meander some more while looking for fuel cells and... Let's just leave it at lots of meandering, lots of banal dialogue, lots of bad acting and a thankless appearance by Lance Henrickson. Why didn't they put Henrickson in charge of the mission? The man has presence and the young crew members simply do not.

And the end? It's as predictable as the rest of the film. Oh, and don't forget to count how many times the characters mention the word "screamers". Screenwriter Miguel Tejada-Flores seems to think it's a really cool word and repeats it every opportunity he gets.

I was extremely excited to learn that somebody picked up the story again and moved forward with it. And after watching "Screamers: The Hunting", I think Sheldon Wilson owes fans of the original film an apology.

I thought the original sleeper 'Screamers (1995) (with Peter Weller) was an agreeable, if unspectacular sci-fi thriller, which at the base had an intriguing story but this cheaper and straight to DVD fare doesn't do anything out of the ordinary but to stew up the same get-up linked together by a bunch of uninspired ideas and devices. The background of these deadly creations doesn't pull you in anymore and the throwaway script could've done a lot more than the predictable situation we found the story opts for. The sub-standard special effects were reasonably catered for such a production, they weren't great nor were they terrible. Even with its crisp look, better than expected performances (led by a stern Gina Holden and a small part for Lance Henriksen) and some bloody pulp (with some very vicious attacks). However it did lack a relentless sense of paranoid intensity for any of the thrills to work and made the pace completely haggard. Every now and then I would check the timer on the DVD player and to my surprise it was going to be a drag… a real slow viewing. Tell me, you couldn't see that sudden revelation coming too? As it is, 'The Hunting' is a bland b-movie which makes you appreciate the original even more.

This one isn't Movie Theatre grade by any measure. But it aims a little higher than pure "Made-for-TV" or "Direct-to-DVD" offerings.

Mercenary/Rescue mission answers a distress signal coming from a previously thought lost planet/colony from the previous 'Screamer' chapters. They land and attempt to survive while unraveling the aftermath of that world's little "civil war".

Many reviewers will give a thumbs down for the predictability-- but seriously, there's nothing wrong with formula if it entertains. And I think we should give the film makers some credit for not immediately letting the viewer clue in on the plot twist until late into the movie.

The FXs were believable and well done, and the space ship was cool. Even the Uniforms were neat. There's gore, but it was measured and not ridiculously over the top.

This movie is good for a slow Saturday afternoon with munchies. And no- you don't need to see the previous 'Screamer' Installments to understand or enjoy this one.

My main quibble-- Why are some Sci-Fi movies makers always defaulting to a Shot of Mars and the Valles Marineris when they need to posit an alien world orbiting another star? Jeez-- photoshop yer own planet, for chrissakes!