Survivor

This film is, indeed, all about Danielle Chuchran. She is beautiful, incredibly athletic and a quite decent actress. The sci- fi in the film is of the type of Firefly, you know, you go to another planet and there are American cowboys there. So not that much. However, the few sci- fi bits in the story did further it, so in my mind that part was a success.

After enjoying the hell out of Shadow of the Cabal, I had to see this movie as well, especially since it starred Danielle, and I can tell you it did not disappoint. The story, as usual (shame, Arrowstorm!), was a bit silly, but simple enough to not bother me tremendously. Kevin Sorbo did play a larger role, although it's becoming a pattern in these films: he appears as some sort of father authority figure, does a few scenes, then splits.

The action scenes were really good, as expected from a professional stunt actress, but also the director has to be good at it. The scenes were great and reminded me of the orc elf battle that hooked me when watching Shadow of the Cabal. The implanted computer, scanner and holographic screen was a great addition and allowed the story to move fast over some logistical problems like how people find each other, coordinate over large distances and detect food or injuries.

There were issues with the film. The technical details in the introduction almost threw me off completely in the beginning of the film. The character of Weston was ridiculous and completely unnecessary - they could have done more with him. Also they took their sweet time to "get it". I won't spoil it here, but as a hint just listen carefully at the alien language and you can figure it out in the first 15 minutes.

Other than that, few characters and a lot less character development made this almost a pure action film. Danielle was great, and also Melanie Stone, which you may (barely) recognize from the Mythica series. Sorbo acted well, but his character was a little bit ridiculous. He had a lot of scenes about bones and almost all cracked me up - no pun intended (OK, I did intend it a little).

It is far from perfect, but was one of the best movies in this particular genre and I really don't understand the mostly mean comments the film has received here. I mean, if they would have used cars instead of running around it would have been Mad Max, and you bloody loved that one!

I was pretty much captivated by the lead actress and would have turned it off after 15 minutes if not for her. That face! My guess is she played some kind of sport growing up because she's athletic and easily the best part about this movie since she lends some credibility to the action sequences and has amazingly expressive eyes. As an aside Hollywood seems to have forgotten how important facial expressions are in conveying what is going on, preferring to dazzle with effects and hammer you over the head with inane dialogue.

Anywho, Chuchran does a great job, but it's just too rough with too little plot for anyone to overcome.

First of all, I didn't expect much from this going into it, which helps with this sort of thing. I was pleasantly surprised.

It's all a matter of expectation. I used to browse the sci-fi sections of the video stores back in the 90s trying to find anything decent and this move was better than a LOT of what I watched back then.

It's better than all of these similar-themed movies I watched back in the day: - Survivor (1987) - Nightfall (1988) - Def-Con 4 (1985) - Cherry 2000 (1987) - Cyborg (1989) - maybe not too much better than this one, but a little.

I would put in on about the same level of cheesy sci-fi action fare as:

• Battle Beyond the Stars (1980) - Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone (1983)

(well maybe not as good as the last one)

Seriously though, if you don't expect much of this, you'll probably be entertained.

• pretty good action

• pretty good low-budget special effects

• plot moves along pretty well without too many lags

• good make up effects

• lots of gorgeous southern Utah scenery

• strong lead performances by Chuchran and Sorbo

Overall, I would describe it as a pretty decent Sci-Fi time waster.

And to reference other commenter's' mentions of Morlocks, this movie is WAY better than the Guy Pierce/Jeremy Irons, The Time Machine (2002)!

If you are interested in another Chuchran/Lyde collaboration, The Curse of the Dragon Slayer (2013) is also a pretty decent 80s style fantasy/sword & sorcery flick.

This "movie" is about a running blond pretty girl. Originally she came from a spaceship, but that does not matter very much. The story is paper thin or to say it precisely, there is no story. It is one of that stories which is that flat, that it bends time and space and you know not only from the beginning how this movie will end, you will just know the complete plot. Thats because you have seen this story in 10 other equal cheap "Oh no! My spaceship crashed!" scifi movies. I am pretty sure the screenplay was not longer then. "Ships having an accident, then pretty girl runs around, kills some evil dudes, finds a horse yadayadayada the end." Its one of that movies you can watch when you already planned to fall asleep at your couch or when you are drunk like a skunk and want to watch some easy nothing. If you watching it sober, you will for sure fast forward half of the movie.

Danielle C. Ryan runs so much in Survivor that I started training for a 5k race because of it. She runs on hills, rocks, and more rocky terrain. She even would run underwater if she could. She scales cliffs, darts through caves, and unsympathetically tells her crew mate "you're going to die" (maybe because she's not a good runner?). Most of the movie is like a cross-fit advert.

It has a weak story and every enemy overacts (i.e., flips, spins through air, flails, etc.) when killed but if you watch Survivor with low expectations it's not terrible.