La Mutante

For thirty years, powerful telescopes have been scanning the space searching from signal of alien civilization. In 1974, the SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) team sends a message to the space with the human DNA, map of our solar system and other information. In return, they receive two messages: the first one, with a catalyst for methane; the second, a detailed alien DNA together with instructions to join it with human DNA. The result of the experiment is the deadly creature Sil. When Dr. Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley), who is leading the research, decides to terminate the experiment, the girl Sil (Michelle Williams) escapes to Los Angeles. Dr. Fitch joins the mercenary Preston Lennox (Michael Madsen); the anthropologist Dr. Stephen Arden (Alfred Molina); the scientist Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger); and the empathic Dan Smithson (Forest Whitaker) to chase Sil (Natasha Henstridge). Sooner they discover that the predator Sil has grown-up and became a beautiful woman, trying to copulate to generate an offspring.

"Species" is one of the best sci-fis of the 90's. Full of action, sexy and with a great cast, this film introduces the stunning Natasha Henstridge, one of the most gorgeous and sexy actresses of Hollywood ever. Her debut could not be better, and together with the cult Michael Madsen, they make this pleasant movie work. The story recalls those B-movies from the 50's, but spiced with erotic and very sexy scenes. I have just watched this movie for the fourth time, and I do not get tired to this attractive story. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "A Experiência" ("The Experience")

Admittedly you would either need to be 50 plus with a good memory, or to be a well-versed student of older sci-fi but in 1961 Miss Julie Christie made her screen debut in the British TV Sci-fi serial A FOR ANDROMEDA. The plot? Signals are received from deep-space seemingly the blue-print for the creation of human life. Scientists of course find the opportunity way too tempting and before you can say "Told you that was a dumb move!" we have a genetically engineered, rather stunning young blonde walking around the lab, causing all sorts of political and scientific unrest.....sound familiar?

Yep, SPECIES was a total conceptual rip-off and to my knowledge, either no-one has ever noticed the fact OR has failed to put such view into print. Certainly not a solitary film critic worldwide that I read at the time was aware of the fact! That said, SPECIES wasn't a total flopperoo although Ben Kingsley looked majorly uncomfortable, if not stunned for the greater part of the flick, as the head science honcho really wanting his creation (the delectable and statuesque Miss Henstridge) dead on sight....a task he bequeathes to Mr Madsen who always enjoys work of this sort!

Never really scales the heights. Neither a major gore-fest or a jaw-dropping ALIEN-wannabe. It labors on beneath its own mediocrity and when it finally finishes, about the only emotion left to the viewer is.."Hmmmmm, OK, now I've seen SPECIES....what's for dinner?" Compared to its sequel however, it remains a rare masterpiece!

Let's face it, SPECIES is a B movie with an A list cast & production design to match. It's a deceptive entertainment that finally shows it's hand during the boring, silly showdown in the sewer level from Quake II where you have to find the red key & beat the boss monster without the quad damage. I'd always drown before I could find the biosuit. Why this was never made into an adults oriented video game is beyond me, other than the obvious problem with marketing it to teenagers.

The whole SPECIES franchise was meant to cash in on the success of the ALIEN films, obviously, and go straight for the amniotic fluid in the reproductive cycle at the expense of logic, probability, and science. It's probably a better movie than it had to be and I'm sure that multiple viewings will bring out more nuances, though that's probably not the idea they had in mind when making it. Once will suffice for most viewers.

I enjoyed seeing Natasha Henstridge naked, however, and the H.R. Giger creature designs are fabulous as always. In fact I wondered, is the whole film really a contrivance just to get to see Giger's aliens mating with humans? Why yes, it probably is. And for some people that's enough to warrant watching it regardless of whom the lead body actress is. Giger's designs were sexually suggestive to begin with and with this movie he finally got to see them doing the nasty. I trust he was well paid.

In any event it's a wildly popular film for reasons that have nothing to do with the professionalism of the cast & crew. Which by the way someone should have told them before prodding us with their serious, emotive performances that serve as buffer zones between the sex & ooze scenes. Only Michael Madsen seems to be aware that it was essentially an exploitation film and acts accordingly. He's spoken of his pride in the work and it shows, especially when considering that he turned up for SPECIES 2 with it's bonus deathmatch levels and Capture The Flag mod.

6/10

Not all movies have to be intense and hard to figure out. Sometimes they can just be fun, and this one is.

You have to suspend disbelief on a few technical scientific things, such as sending a message from SETI into outer space, remember that radio waves travel at the speed of light, and the nearest star to use is 4.3 light years away. So at BEST it would take 8 years to send/receive a message, but most stars in our galaxy are 50,000 light years away or so, so the message to one of those would take 100,000 years to send/receive.

Then we can't create DNA of a human, how are we going to create the DNA of an Alien species from scratch given just the data about it? But don't worry about those details, just have fun with it, watch the pretty little half-alien girl kill with much gore.. And the team of experts they send to catch the now fully-grown woman/alien is kind of fun too. Very cliché characters, but still fun.

I like the deep, hard-to-understand movies as well, but this one kept me entertained all the way through. Not the greatest movie ever made but not boring either. A fun B-movie type science fiction/horror movie, but with good actors.

I'm giving it an 8, which to me means, "liked it", whereas a 6 to me would mean "it was OK". It was more than OK so I give it an 8.

Is 'Species' a groundbreaking, visionary SF movie? No, of course not. Is it silly, trashy, but FUN b-grade exploitation SF in the tradition of Tobe Hooper's 'Lifeforce'? You bet! It isn't quite as entertaining as 'Lifeforce', the original naked space chick movie, but it's a still pretty good way to waste an hour and a half of your life. Why it gets slammed so much is beyond me. Maybe people just don't have a sense of humour. The opening of the movie is terrific. In a lab we see a cold scientist (Ben Kingsley) overseeing the murder of a young girl (Michelle Williams), imprisoned in a glass case. Only she escapes by showing some super human strength. She is immediately pursued by dozens of soldiers, but manages to elude them. We then learn she is in fact a genetic experiment, a mixing of extraterrestrial and human DNA. Kingsley heads up a task force consisting of Michael Madsen, Alfred Molina, Marg Helgenberger and Forest Whitaker, each a specialist in a different field. Pretty soon our alien fugitive mutates into a gorgeous blonde (Natasha Henstridge), who spends most of her time topless. Kingsley and company face a race against time, they must capture the horny alien girl before she screws guys to death(?) or something... Who knows. Henstridge is great to look at and the above average cast give it their best shot with the lame dialogue and cliched scenes. Whitaker's empath character quickly irritates with his constant stating the bleedin' obvious, but I always get a kick out of watching Madsen, here in stereotypical tough guy mode. 'Species' is big dumb fun.