Project Shadowchaser III (1995 Video) User Reviews

standard 90s sci-fi actioner

[dien · 5/10 · 17 September 2012]

This film represents one of my favourite genres - 1990s sci-fi action (usually Alien rip-off) taking space on a spaceship or a space station. If you know what kind of genre I am talking about, you will know what to expect from this film.

The cast is multinational, where pretty much everyone is a stereotype to some extend. Or described using the basic characteristic features from a particular nationality. The plot usually involves a small crew (even on a huge spaceship) coming across some alien creature and having to fight for survival. In this case, the enemy is a Russian android infected by some unknown virus (that's never really explained). It's a pity that Frank Zagarino (a.k.a. the Shadowchaser) only gets a limited screen time and barely uses his martial arts skills. The rest of the cast is OK, especially Musetta Vander is easy on the eye (even though her fake Russian accents is terrible).

The part I have always liked about these films is that the producers use any factory they can to stand in for the spaceship/space station. It's simply hilarious. So get yourself some popcorn and some beer and enjoy. I know I will :)

Not boring between one explosion and the next

[unbrokenmetal · 5/10 · 5 June 2006]

Somewhere beyond Mars, one space ship hits another which disappeared 25 years ago. Rea (Musetta Vander) knows it was the ship of her father, and wants to find out what killed its crew.

Obviously, it's another rip-off with the usual "Terminator" and "Alien" ingredients, also "The Thing", "Outland" and "Total Recall" come to mind. The story incorporates the usual clichés, but still it's not too bad when you are looking for some simple fun. In opposite to a few other low-budget SF flicks, I wasn't bored between one explosion and the next, some actors are worth mentioning: Christopher Neame, Musetta Vander and Christopher Atkins did a good job.

Besides, the German dubbing is surprisingly good. Whereas in other low-budget SF movies, one often has the impression they are reading their lines off the sheet, in "Shadowchaser III", where there's a lot of screaming going on, the voice actors are really into it and create the necessary passion.

Bizarre continuity is the real star of the movie

[Resprung · 1/10 · 18 May 2004]

This is so poor it's watchable.

The plot deals with a grizzled spaceship crew happening upon a drifting, apparently abandoned Russian craft.

In the empty vastness of space, the two craft accidentally collide (!) - and 'Alien'-esque fun ensues as a cyborg from the Russian ship menaces our crew.

The spacecraft interiors are clearly a dolled-up factory set (metal walkways, boilers, piping). In this entirely unconvincing setting, 'Kody', 'Snake' and the rest of our hero crew grimace, grunt, run about and continually and repeatedly rack their shotguns without firing them.

The continuity gaffes are what define this movie, and they are nothing short of amazing:

Stuff appears and disappears. The shotguns are racked. A cigar gets longer by being smoked. The shotguns are racked again, just to make sure. Content of a bottle increases by being drunk from.

The film progresses through the usual clichés by way of intense ham acting, poxy camera work and Ed Wood quality props to a showdown climax.

Who Goes there? The Alien Terminator from Andromeda.

[junk-monkey · 1/10 · 28 December 2006]

As other reviews have said, another of the countless number of Alien clones, this time with a great wodge of The Terminator thrown in, add a bit of the classic SF Story "Who Goes There?", and a insanely stupid plot device lifted from The Andromeda Strain (apparently flashing red lights make rampaging killer 'droids unable to detect scared people standing three inches away from them).

OK, the story: after a sequence of people running around in a space ship and killing each other we get a caption.

"25 years later".

The crew of a relay station orbiting Mars, due to be relieved in 48 hours, detect a ginormous space ship on a collision course. It's The Siberia, the ship we saw in the opening sequence. Not a good time to have taken everything useful off-line on the relay station to do some repairs then. The approaching ship doesn't deviate from its course and is broadcasting a "Do NOT under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES Enter This Ship!" warning. After a lot of shouting at each other, the crew of the relay station patch something together and get the station out of the way just in the nick of time. But the ship changes course and rams them any way - impaling one of the crew on a stick-outy pointy crew impaler thing. The satellite starts to "loose integrity". Bits de-pressurise. Lots more shouting and running about in which only two crew people are sucked out into space backwards. (Why are they ALWAYS sucked out backwards?).

After a few keystrokes the wheelchair bound techy (who is called 'Wheeler' - the only only detectable joke in the whole movie) deduces that the Siberia is draining them of all their power and they need to go aboard her and switch off its engines. They all go on-board and take their helmets off. "Do NOT Enter This Ship!" obviously means get on board the ship and expose yourself to possibly fatal infectious diseases. One team head for the Main Computer room where they find a dead frozen guy clutching what looks like an American Express card but turns out to be a minidisc. The other team find some switches. Amazingly the dead bloke turns out to be the father of the attractive female crew member voted most likely to survive an encounter with a rampaging alien. They switch the engines off but this means the ships reactor will explode. A spooky Point of View Shot starts killing people. There's some guff about the Siberia having discovered an new ore, a petential power source worth millions, which mean the more venal members of the crew immediately thrust themselves into danger to get hold of it. The POV shot returns with whoosh! whoosh! walking noises on the soundtrack. Unfortunately these give you the idea the killer is wearing corduroy trousers and the effect is wasted.

After that it's all just running around and getting killed in order of ugliness and acting ability, until only the obvious survivors survive - along with the cute dog which had managed to lead at least two crew members to their deaths. Just why space hardened veterans wander into the jaws of certain death looking for their pets cats and dogs has long been a mystery of this kind of movie. Other stupid highlights include everyone forgetting to act the falling levels of oxygen until reminded by the voice of the on-board computer (not that the low levels of oxygen in any way dampen any of the impressive fires this load of idiots start). If the Killer Droid id so clever it can steer the ship in a tight curve and have another go at ramming the relay station why didn't it turn off the "Do NOT under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES Enter This Ship!" warning signal.. I'm sure if it was looking for more people to kill then yelling GO AWAY! was not a good way of going about it.

Musetta Vander is the only person who gets to do any acting - everyone else just flares their nostrils all the time while baring their teeth and shouting and pointing guns at each other. It that sort of script; full of exclamation marks - the only thing that kept me watching till the end was the hope that the script demand she take all her clothes off, or get wet while not wearing a lot. Unfortunately it didn't. One of the things wrong with this movie (apart from it having more cyan put on screen than in any other movie ever) is that there was no gratuitous nudity.

The first two films in this series were far better than this one.

[DigitalRevenantX7 · 2/10 · 26 August 2015]

Twenty-five years after it disappeared without trace, the lost spaceship Siberia reappears, somehow set on a collision course with the Martian communications space station Comstat-5. The station's crew survive the collision but are shocked to discover that both ships are now headed for re-entry into Mars' atmosphere. Boarding the Siberia in order to divert the course, they discover a fortune in rare ore from the planet Juno 5 & that the original crew is all dead. They are then attacked by some kind of unknown force. After sustaining several casualties, the survivors discover that the killer is an android that has been corrupted by the new ore, having the ability to change its appearance & look like one of them.

First up, I am a big fan of the original PROJECT SHADOWCHASER. It may have been a cheap sci-fi action film but for me it was an enjoyable guilty pleasure with a plot that can be best described as DIE HARD meets THE TERMINATOR. I'm a sucker for either film type & combining the two concepts together was for me a stroke of genius. As for the sequels, the second film – PROJECT SHADOWCHASER II: NIGHT SIEGE – was action-packed but missed out on the original's fun, instead being a rather crude action film that frequently verged on the ridiculous (although it did have some style, making it pretty average as an action film). This second sequel is even worse.

Project Shadowchaser III is probably the worst of the bunch. The film really has no plot to it – all it has for a story is the clichés of your standard ALIEN templater, although there is no evil corporation here but plenty of greedy souls on board. And there are not one but TWO spaceships for the action to take place in. Director John Eyres has managed to restrain his style of action to make the film more character driven but without a good story the characters here suffer badly.

On the plus side, the central villain (played by the series' star Frank Zagarino) is given an air of mystery to make things interesting, but this is undone by the fact that the polymorphic nature of the android is ill-thought out – there are times when the android seems to be in two places at once, making this film look stupid. The internal logic is almost non-existent in places & some scenes descend into the absurdly silly – like one scene where the crew shout at each other over which way a switch should be flicked. The visual effects are competent & the model work is reasonably detailed.

Nu Production Strikes Again

[adcdid · 2/10 · 12 July 2000]

Each year the company called Nu produces couple of "action packed", "full of suspense" movies. This little nugget, called Shadowcaster III(Until I visited this site I wasn't avare this is a whole trilogy), is a great example of the good job the company is doing. Frank Zagarino is as mean as always and does a great job as almost undestructable(?), schizophrenic(??) android. I won't waste any more words since I don't want to reveal the terrific plot and ruin you a couple of great laughs.

Rating 2/10 (Revard for those hard working tehnicians. Man, putting together this kind of rubbish must be nervewracking.)

A "pleasant" story to enjoy for 90 or so minutes

[Rosettes · 8/10 · 10 March 2013]

(SPOILERS possible) Why do we watch movies? To be entertained? To engage on a bit of fantasy? Or to be critics? In my case, it is probably often the second and this movie certainly took me into fantasy for a while.

I won't deny that there are aspects in this movie that are so easily found in others. Leviathan, Deep Star Six, salvage themes of the Alien series, and so forth. But Edison, I believe, said there were only so many original stories and everything else is a retelling.

The high points: This movie, somehow, made me feel tinges of living on an oil derrick, tinges of fear of what it may have been like on Texas Tower 4.

The action is constant and can have some quite unexpected twists.

There is steady secondary theme that keeps one glued to the movie to the very end.

Character development for most of the cast is excellent, one can connect with most of them, think of them as friends, coworkers, or other wise.

There was the feel of oil derrick cabin fever, of what one does not to provoke anyone...and then how that all fell apart when the crisis started.

The movie ends on a definite feel good note so that if one were watching it in a theater, they could go back into the sun, feeling refreshed.

The low point: Those who died early, we never really knew. Therefore, it is difficult to feel their loss in the movie.

I picked this movie out of my collection as part of a sci fi movie watching marathon; I was not disappointed. Further, I gave this movie an 8 because although now seen, it struck me as the kind of movie that I could go back in the future to watch again and again.

Is it a stellar movie that they will say great things on about the cast and crew? Probably not. Is it a good movie that one can escape from their own world for a short time? Most certainly.

I liked it, fast paced movie.

[roglas · 10/10 · 9 November 2003]

Robina Alston was the best of the cast as the tough Lee, Musseta Vander has little to do but to look scared and pretty. The film is well acted, full of action, lots of explotions, well acted, some suspenseful scene, one of two greatly staged chase scenes about the spaceship, okay effects and one cool death scene.

Not enough Frank

[heroofchaos-1 · 23 April 2008]

Basically not enough Frank Zagarino. He was the best part about Project Shadow Chaser 2. He was hardly in this one. I watched this hoping he would camp his way through it like he did in the second one. I though maybe Christopher Neame would be able to save this movie after seeing him in Hellbound, but I was wrong. Christopher Atkins just made the same face the whole movie so don't see it because of him. Sam Bottoms equals lame. Musetta Vander is in millions of cheap sci-fi movies, but she doesn't do anything besides act sad or afraid. So if you were planning on seeing this because of Frank don't as he isn't in it enough.