User Reviews

Project Viper starts on a spaceship named the Olympus which is heading for Mars on a mission to deliver a genetically created organism named Viper which will terraform the planet & make it inhabitable for us humans. Unfortunately things go wrong & the entire crew end up dead & the Olympus ends up floating helplessly in space. NASA suspect a conspiracy & call in Mike Connors (Patrick Muldoon) to check things out & retrieve the other Viper from Novagen Industries where it was developed, however some very bad people want the sole remaining Viper & kill scientist Diane Cafferty (Lydie Denier) & replace her with someone who looks exactly the same. The impostor manages to gain access to the Novagen labs where she steals the Viper, despite the best attempts of Connors & the security guards she manages to escape. Connors job is now to track the Viper down & destroy it, he enlists the help of the Novagen scientists who created it, Nancy Burnham (Theresa Russell), Steve Elkins (Billy Keane), Sidney Bream (Tamara Davis) & Alan (Daniel Quin) to track it down. News soon reaches Nasa that a plane has crashed near a Mexican town & the Viper was definitely on board, by the time Connors gets there the Viper has disappeared, is on the loose & killing anyone it comes across...

When I discovered that Project Viper was directed by Jim Wynorski under his usual pseudonym of Jay Andrews my heart sank, I went from hoping that I was about to watch an entertaining sci-fi horror to just hoping I would stay awake for the duration & not lose the will to live. The tedious, slow-moving, unoriginal & overly serious script by Curtis Joseph & David Mason is standard low budget sci-fi crap that focuses on the deeply dull conspiracy theory's & double crosses rather than the films main selling point the genetically created creature thing which isn't even mentioned let alone seen for a good 30 minutes! The character's are dull & clichéd, the plot twists are extremely predictable & routine. It's never really explained how the Viper thing was created & Project Viper eventually descends into a bland alien killing random townspeople type film that there are literally 100's of already. There are so many better more worthwhile sci-fi monster films out there for anyone to be bothering with such a bland, boring, routine, unexciting & throughly predictable piece of low budget film-making.

Director Wynorski again turns in another forgettable slice of low budget nonsense. It has no style or visual flair & two of it's best scenes are in fact taken/stolen from Species (1995) & Air America (1990), I wonder if he's allowed to just take footage from another film & use it? The special effects aren't too bad actually, the opening shots of the spaceship orbiting the Earth are fairly impressive as is the scenes of the Viper chasing a jeep through some caves at the end, I was expecting worse. There's no gore in it, a couple of gory mutilated bodies & that's it.

I'm pretty sure the budget was low on Project Viper but that still doesn't excuse it from being bland & dull, it's reasonably well made but it's hardly going to win any awards. The acting was poor & nobody seemed liked they wanted to be there & had that 'what am I doing in this?' look on their faces, I can't say I blame them. Just to reassure actors everywhere there is life after a Jim Wynorski film as Russell has gone from this to having a role in the forthcoming Spider-Man 3 (2007) film.

Project Viper is crap, it's as simple & straight forward as that really. Not worth your time or money, there are far better films out there, one to avoid.

Yes, this borrows ideas (and in some cases, actual scenes!) from other popular recent horror/sci-fi films, but that doesn't make this boring. In fact, it's actually pretty entertaining overall.

Astronauts aboard the spaceship Olympus, which is doing some work around Mars, have some major power surge problems right before they're about to do a live TV broadcast and are all presumed dead after contact with NASA is lost. It may have something to do with Project VIPER, an experiment mixing gene microbiology with computer technology and developed at Novagen Industries, a government run facility rife with corruption. Scientist Diana (Lydie Denier) is shot dead and replaced by an identical double who breaks into the lab, guns down a dozen or so people and escapes with the second VIPER prototype. She's involved in a plane crash near the Mexican border and the program, described by one character as "living, breathing acid," kills her and the pilot and escapes into the woods. Confused yet? Well I was too at first, but after the busy opening twenty minutes or so, this settles down quite nicely and becomes an entertaining little low-budget thriller, with horror and sci-fi elements.

The program creators; chief scientist Nancy Burnham (Theresa Russell), programmer Steve (Billy Keane), computer expert Sydney (Tamara Davies) and doctor Alan (Daniel Quinn), are teamed up with smart-ass, tough guy government agent Mike Conners (Patrick Muldoon) to stop the creature before it can multiply. Naturally, one of the five has intentionally tampered with the program and created a nearly unstoppable killing machine. Tim Thomerson has a nice supporting role as a cancer-stricken small town Springfield sheriff perplexed by the string of grisly murders in his town. The ever-growing creature impales and gobbles up victims whole, can mimic any molecular structure, is usually seen as a tentacled silver blob, leaves behind a metallic slime trail wherever it visits and hangs out in the small town because of the high uranium content in the water supply, which has also led to a high cancer rate in the town. Does that make this the horror movie answer to ERIN BROCKOVICH? Actually it sort of does now that I'm thinking about it; especially when Curtis Armstrong ("Booger" from REVENGE OF THE NERDS) shows up as a lawyer trying to get the townsfolk to sue the city. Regular viewers of Cinemax may want to note there's also a brief appearance by buxom Ohio native Lorissa McComas in a small supporting role.

Though a bit hard to follow at first, the story is passable, there's plenty of action (and explosions) and some welcome comedy. The production values, acting and special effects are all pretty good and it is one of more professional offerings from 'B' kingpin Jim Wynorski, who for some reason uses an alias ("Jay Andrews") for what turns out to be one of his best films. It debuted on the Sci-Fi Channel.

I've set this as containing spoilers, but it's hard to spoil an already awful movie.

A cliché move with cliché roles done on a shoe string budget. The lack of money is obvious given the two scenes taken from other movies. The first scene a car crash down a hill taken from species, and the second a plane crash taken from Air America. There may have also been a third scene taken from Broken arrow of a mine exploding.

The actors aren't normally this bad but being hampered by the awful dialog I almost felt sorry for them. It's the actor job equivalent of stacking shelves at a super market.

The only reason I didn't vote this movie as (1)-Awful is because I actually watched it all, and if I had voted it (1) it would be saying it was as bad as Street Fighter.

This underrated movie had excellent Quality in every aspect except perhaps screenplay. The photography, Audio & editing are comparable in quality to any top rated scifi. It also had recognizable Stars like John Beck (Mark Grayson on Dallas). It also had some fairly decent effects.

The story was good regarding 2 engineered creatures from a CIA front company. One creature sent to Mars kills the astronauts. A second creature, stolen using sophisticated methodologies which gets loose. Inside job. Agents & developers sent to find it.

Here are the weak points in the screenplay. Dumb character behaviors such as putting their hands in creature goo, wearing no protection, having no weapons when sneaking up on it (such as a freeze gun or flame thrower or chemical deterrent) until the end.

Scientists can't describe their own creation, have no sense of urgency, have bad attitudes and are of no help, 3 ignore their own tracking device alerting the creatures presence, and go right where they shouldn't (even though they know it is there & just killed their teammates). The town is not evacuated & no military presence (probably lack of budget.) Town cop locks up gov't & NASA agent. Gov't agent is a bad version of a 007 wannabe (not the actors fault). The screenplay must have been written by an untrained neophyte.

Except for the screenplay, this movie is excellent quality. Better than the junk films getting hundreds of millions which can't compare to this underrated film. The critics sound like 10 year olds who trash things as bullies wanting attention. This film doesn't deserve the treatment this roving gang of underage neophytes & bullies are dishing out.

This movie was shamelessly included as one of two bonus movies on a DVD which was only listed after you started the DVD. Yet the real rotten movies far worse always seem to get their own DVD with great artwork & disappointment when you start them. There are bad movies, but this isn't one of them.

People also need to remember the actors are following a specific script, dialogue, behavior & setting. They are following script & direction. They do what they are told by the script & director. Not making it up as they go along.

Don't listen to people who deliberately trash good films like beating up a school mate just for the fun of it.

This came on an Asteroid DVD at Walmart. I highly recommend the film. Especially to those who loved 50's & 60's & 80's scifi. The story; reminds me of an Outer limits episode, The Voyage Home, in the 90's where a creature from Mars came back with the Astronauts (One was Michael Dorn, Worf from Star Trek). He was in that OL episode. Not this film. Their creature had a few more tricks but similar.

This film has better production quality than Alien Even better than the recent Star Wars film with Ford & Fisher.

This film has a recognizable cast & a decent story. If not for the screenplay with poorly written scenes. Actually, the scenes were good. It was the character behaviors in those scenes which were badly written. This could have been a top ten movie if they had been given enough budget for an upgraded creature.

I rarely rate movies this high.

Try it. If those of you over 40 like it, please share it.

well i first watched this movie today and from what i read in the TV Guide listing , i thought it would be good. The premise of the plot seemed like a good one, but they just didn't write the story well enough for it to be considered a hit. I started to get bored of it and do other things for a little bit in the beginning , but then i decided to go back and watch it tell it ended. some of the plot holes i noticed make the actors in the movies look like raging moons. Judging by how many i caught the time i actually watched this movie, there properly is more that i didn't see.

The first one i noticed was when the 3 of so called, "Scientists" were in the house doing some computer research on viper. The power suddenly went out (there is there first clue they idiotically missed) so instead of realizing its viper , they just assume something unknown caused this power outage , even though they know viper is in town , and that he feeds on electricity because he is part hardware. Then the second part of this scene that made little sense to me , is that one of the Guys was actually dumb enough to go down into the basement to try and restart the breaker , which didn't work... DUH! Another thing that didn't make sense is instead of after hearing a loud growling noise , instead of running like a mad man out of there which he had time to do , he just stands there not even looking behind him at the basement for 5-10 seconds while Viper comes up behind him and rams him in the ass , eating him and killing him. How stupid can a person be ? I thought these guys where supposed to be smart ? Some of the techniques used in here make it look like a 60's horror film , and less like a 2002 Sci-fi flick. The next thing i noticed that made little sense was the Viper tracking machine was going off like a chicken with its head cut off, and the both the 2 guys who went into the basement went right by it and even looked at it for a second , but still continued , didn't they know it was a viper tracking system , and it was going off ? even a child could figure out something is up. The next thing that i guess sort a of make sense , but we didn't really know it at the time is , when the 2nd guy goes down into the basement , after seeing the dead guys remains that are left after viper ate him, he decides to have a sit on the step there and ponder his life. we find out later that he has some control of viper with that little device he has , but he didn't have it in his hands and viper could of killed him in seconds before he had time to shut viper down. The next thing i see is , after the girl scientist in the house sees the tracking device , she actually knows what it means , thats not the hole though , the hole is what happens next , she hears the 2nd guy on the phone talking to the guy that is funding his traitor-ist/spy what ever he is. She obviously can hear him because she's looking to see where he's out , so if she can hear what he's saying , why does she need to get closer for him to see her ? which soon after gets here killed ? what a stupid bimbo! There is no reason for her to stand out in the open so the 2nd guy can see her and know she's knows what's going on , other then so the guy can see her , and kill her. The next thing is after the guy goes into an office room there , she decides to go to the office where the guy in and fallow him i guess or maybe she wants to go out the door and runaway, she must really want to die. of course the guy comes out and starts chasing her around the house trying to kill her, the weird part is when the guy says no your not leaving and looks the door ? he doesn't use a key or anything , so why later when she comes back down stairs and tries to go out the door , wont it open ? last time i checked all you have to do is turn the look to unlock the door from the inside , the same lock he turned to so called lock it ? she either really dumb or really stupid , maybe both. She just really wants to die i guess , she then runs down into the basement , where she's 1 die is dead by viper , and decides to stay down there , until finally she gets killed. real shocker! geesh if that was a real situation , fate must of really hated her! The next one is more of a goof then a plot hole. When the guy and the girl are in the jail cell , and the 3rd guy that was the only survivor from the house shows up , were we learn he can control viper.etc. well when viper shows up there , viper is in the main jail room ,because the 3rd guy is standing next to him looking at the hero guy and girl who are still in the cell, but after he pushes the button viper falls down and then after the good guy opens the stall banging the 3rd guy in the head , he drops the controller , and it goes into the jail cell next to them , viper then re-emerges. after the girl kicks smacks the controller out of the cell , the guy steps on it smashing it , and viper rebuilds its self . then the good guy kicks the bad guy into the cell where viper is now ? wait i thought he was in the main room not a cell ?? and then when the Sheriff and deputy come in with shotguns and go cuss and start shooting at it , viper is in the main jail cell again! not in the jail stall where he was when the hero guy kicked the bad guy there into viper where he got ate. They screwed up this scene by putting viper where he needs to be to fit the script , and where he physically should be. well done writers!(sarcasm!) There are a few more but i just have to mention one more, that maybe be one of the biggest idiotic movies of this movie. When the sheriff and the hero and girl are in the cave , for some reason the sheriff tells them that he's dyeing of cancer and he should deploy the emp , so he grabs the emp bomb and decides like a complete moron to run right next to viper , i guess he wants to get eating quickly , and if he thinks that wouldn't happen , he's dumber then a rock , because of course viper immediately eats him! DUH ! I'm not sure why the writers wanted to kill him off like that , but hey what ever , maybe they where drinking when writing his part. Well thats all I'm going to tell about , i don't want to bore you to much :P i will give this movie a 3/10 for at least trying to put together a movie, but I'm sorry to say , you failed! Next time you write a movie , make sure the people who are portrayed in the movie have an IQ over 40 , or maybe the writer needs to have that before he writes another imbecile movie like this!