Parasite

I have seen this movie twice and although the actual plot could be deemed as a little far fetched, it really works.

Basically, after a systems failure a ship gets trapped upon the darkside of the moon, where all kinds of weird goings on begin to take place as slowly the crew members are picked off one by one by an unseen assailant/assailants.

The actual film idea itself is excellent and it really does use darkness in the film for the right reasons and as always, desolate space ships make excellent places for horror to hide round every unlit little corner. Add the fact that there is nowhere to run and the horrible feeling of claustrophobia and you have a gem of a move that is slick, doesn't seem over-produced and has a genius idea of a story running through its core.

It is nice to see a film made to scare and not to shock.

It is the year 2022. A mysterious systems failure causes the crew of a spaceship to be stranded on the dark side of the moon...

While this is by no means one of the great science fiction films of our generation, it is unfortunately not easily obtained (although it is on Netflix). Some concepts here are rather clever, most notably the idea of bringing together the Bermuda Triangle and space travel... and then, even throwing in Satanic references, and still having it all make some kind of sense.

The gore was also quite good, though I was confused by the robot (Lesli). I understand she is sort of like the ship's computer and there to answer questions, and I think that makes sense (it sure seems to be common enough in science fiction). But I was confused why she had to be humanoid rather than just built in to the ship. If all she does is sit and talk, why have legs or arms, or even a face?

The Dark Side of the Moon is a creepy but sometimes little stupid (storywise) space horror movie - we get the mark of the beast, the Bermuda Triangle, some space horror, a sexy AI/android. No doubt, this is a low budget B-movie but entertaining in that pulp fiction kind of way. Event Horizon (Paul W. S. Anderson, 1997) may have borrowed some ideas from this one, but is stronger in all aspects (acting, story, production). Anyway, if you want some space horror with a creepy atmosphere and you don't mind a B movie budget you may dare to lock your mind into this one.

PLOT OUTLINE: The year is 2022. While on a mission to repair nuclear-armed spy satellites in Earth orbit, the spaceship Spacecore 1 suffers inexplicable power failure. As it drifts towards the Moon, the crew realize that they have only 24 hours air & heat left. But the real nightmare starts when an old space shuttle mysteriously docks with them, bringing onboard a parasite that is revealed to be the Devil.

Call it what you like, but the one thing you can't accuse The Dark Side of the Moon of is not sticking close to its source material (in this case the landmark sci-fi / horror classic ALIEN). The cast is kept to seven actors, two of them are women as well as one of them being an android (although the android's identity is not a secret). The only difference is that we get not one but two large spaceships for the action to take place in.

On a technical aspect, The Dark Side of the Moon is quite good. The actors take their roles seriously & deliver their performances with a passable competence. Three of the cast are also veterans of the genre, with Joe Turkel coming from BLADE RUNNER, Robert Sampson from RE-ANIMATOR & Camilla More from Friday THE 13TH: THE FINAL CHAPTER. Director D. J. Webster keep things going at a modest pace while attempting to generate as much atmosphere as he can on a low budget (mainly by having the lighting kept to a minimum, which makes watching the VHS tape a real headache since the picture is so dark that only a completely dark room will allow you to see what the hell is going on). Not to mention a score that fits the film well, made by Mark Ryder & Phil Davies (who made the classic TRANCERS score). The only problems I had with the film were the interior shots of the shuttle, which are way bigger than what it should be.

If the technical aspects are good, then what drags the film down to the B-movie gutter is the script. It tries to blend religion with science fiction, something that almost never works, with some bizarre ideas about the Bermuda Triangle being a plot by the Devil to beef up his soul collection; Ol' Scratch being a parasite that hides inside people's bodies (a real half-cocked concept stolen from THE HIDDEN); much nonsense about the significance of 666. It is not hard to imagine that the ideas on paper have some merit, but on film it only proves to be routine B-film fodder that doesn't rise above the sea of similar films that came out during that decade.

You know what's the scary part? Eight years later, the concept was resurrected as EVENT HORIZON by RESIDENT EVIL director Paul W. S. Anderson.

I caught this film late night back in the 90's, when this old low budget horror films were actually done very well. Only saw it the one time back in the day, but bought it recently and gave it another watch. It is a pretty good horror film set in space and I like the supernatural flair added to it. I know Event Horizon is also a supernatural horror set in space and I got that one too. Wanted Nightflyers, the 80's movie, but looks like that one has yet to be released on DVD. I know a lot of people hate that one, but I thought it was pretty cool and totally surprised I found this movie on DVD and not that one. This one is a bit less well known.

So the story pretty much starts quickly as it is the year 2022 (wow, next year) and a crew that repairs satellites armed with nukes has some complications. Let me reiterate that, it has complications right out of the gate as there is no chatting, no backstory for each crew member and no kitty cat...they should of brought a cat along! The ship's computer, which for reasons unknown is a sexy gal sitting in an office chair claims the ship is fine, but things are not fine as life support is failing! Another ship approaches, seemingly piloted by someone and they manage to get air from it and they find the corpse of a man and soon the crew of the imperiled ship begin getting taken over one by one as something sinister is at play!

The cast is pretty good, not an A list ensemble, but they definitely know what they are doing. The sets are pretty good too, a lot of the films around the time this film were made do a better job of creating a spaceship than they do now. Granted, there is no explanation as to why there is gravity in the space shuttle. I can chalk up the gravity in the main ship as because it is so futuristic, but not the shuttle that was apparently from 1992.

So, the film was good, a good atmosphere and the music accompanied it well. It pretty much shoots out of the gates as the crew is in trouble almost immediately. Some gore is present, but this film does not particularly rely on that, more on the whole paranoia thing as anyone could be harboring the evil except for the main guy whom we see pretty much all the time. The film is not the greatest piece of work, but it was entertaining for what it was.