Watching ALIEN EXPRESS inspired feelings of awe, shock, pity and, yes, sheer terror. To think that actors who have done good work in the past should come to something like this. The horror, the horror.Tell me if any of this sounds familiar.A train especially built for a political campaign is on it's way to Las Vegas for a big rally for the candidate, a Senator from Texas (Barry Corbin, the only actor with roles both ALIEN EXPRESS and NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN in the same decade). At a railroad crossing in Utah a meteor incinerates a car waiting for the train to pass.The train stops. Local law enforcement is summoned. Oh, can it be? The Senator has a lovely young lady (Amy Locane from CRY-BABY and MELROSE PLACE) who just happened to have once been married to one of the officers answering the 911 call. Lou Diamond Phillips (STAND AND DELIVER, LA BAMBA) is the ex-husband.Meanwhile eeeeevil aliens have managed to stow away on the train.The train leaves. Lou gets his buddy to pilot a helicopter so that Lou can drop onto the moving train (about 70 miles per hour) so that he can save the day. As the buddy's reward, he crashes the helicopter into the mountain.Which is another example of how poorly written ALIEN EXPRESS is. The cop hero's sidekick must die, we all know that. But he's supposed to die near the end of the third act, usually while saving several lives.Once on the train, Lou manages to lose his shirt so that he can channel Bruce Willis in DIE HARD by wearing a wife beater t-shirt. Yeah, Lou is 46 years old but he hits the gym. The part he's playing isn't worth bothering with, but he's in good shape.The Senator is going to have an afternoon delight with Miss Utah, but aliens intercede and both he and the woman young enough to be his granddaughter pay the ultimate price.Soon we have bomb threats, multiplying aliens, and of course the train goes out of control and speeds toward its date with destiny while Lou and Todd Bridges (DIFF'RENT STROKES) try to save as many lives as they can.There is exactly one surprise in the entire movie. Early in the story a couple lift wine glasses to their thirty-fifth anniversary, with hopes for thirty-five more years together. The dude gets banged up, but he and the Mrs. both live. Maybe the writers just lost track of them.This is the kind of movie that you'd love to be a fly on the wall. These actors who have done better work (and, really, deserve much better than this) are probably just happy for the work. Did they actually think they were working on something worthwhile, or did they cry (and/or drink) themselves to sleep at night? At the end of the story the (fairly numerous, all things considered) survivors gather in the last car of the train, which is unhooked. The other cars go over a cliff but the one containing the protagonists stops just inches short of the cliff.Lou and his ex are reunited. Happiness reigns. I'd have thought that the first thing they'd do was get off the train so they'd have solid ground under their feet, but I digress.Someone looks out the window and sees a shooting star. Look, make a wish. Then another. Then more and more. The Earth is being bombarded with meteors that will crack open and creepy crawly hand puppets with big teeth will be everywhere.It's gotten to a point that seeing the words "The Sci-Fi Channel Presents" on an "original" movie tells us that we'll be glad we have Ti-Vo so that we can fast forward through the next two hours. Or, better yet, just go ahead and erase it two minutes into the story and spend that time more wisely.

I am a big fan of sci-fi movies. So, when I saw this movie in the EPG, I thought I was in for a pleasant evening. What a disappointment ! Such a poor display of "special" effects I could not imagine in 1980, but in 2005 ? Come on, why would you do special effects of an helicopter flying in the desert when you can film a real one for a much lower price (I guess) ? And those killer "muppets"... well, I could do better than that in a couple of hours in the garage. You can expect to have a low budget on a movie, but I don't think it's reasonable to have a low movie for any budget. As for the "star" of the movie (I use a lot of quotes tonight...), Lou Diamond Philips, the guy is not even remotely an actor. Maybe he should have stayed to the martial arts movies. All in all, an awful movie. Maybe I am in a bad mood tonight. Then again, maybe not. A sincere 1 out of 10.

"Dead Rail" isn't the worst Sci-Fi Channel original film.**SPOILERS**Senator Frank Rawlings (Barry Corbin) is traveling on his new high-speed bullet train on his way to a campaign rally on his way to becoming president, but in the desert, a meteorite crashes near the train, stopping it long enough for Vic Holden, (Lou Diamond Phillips) a detective, to investigate the crash. Rawlings wants nothing to do with the crash, and orders his train to move, which it finally does. Convinced the accident is nothing to just throw away, Vic chases after the train and climbs on-board. When his suspicions were right, he discovers the train is infested with strange creatures from space that eat human flesh. Discovering this, he gets the Senator's Secret Service to help him in dealing with the deadly creatures. When all seems lost, he and his wife Rosie (Amy Locane) find out that the train is on a collision course with a gorge that has no support for it. Finding out that fire works best to destroy the creatures, Vic and Rosie decide to plunge the train into the gorge and get the passengers safely out of the way, but the creatures make it harder than they thought.The Good News: OK, I know all about the hate that this movie has generated, and while I agree to some extent, this isn't the worst movie Sci-Fi has shown. That was "Parasite" not this movie. This does have a few redeeming factors. Despite what most of you say, I think most of the special effects work for the film. It has the same kind of charm that the old monster movies have: a cheep-looking creature but nicely imagined that has its own personality. The creatures themselves are given a nice new "power," they can fly around at super-sonic speeds, making them nearly invisible. There is a small flash that follows them around, so you can tell where they were a few seconds earlier. There is a good amount of gore in the film, so this has a small redeeming factor for those fans. We see several bodies completely ripped up, lots of skin missing, a giant pool of blood around the body, as well as the interior being devoured. There is also some great looking dismemberment, a gaggle of scratches and rips, and even some blood splatter. This does fit the tradition of hardly-dry Sci-Fi films. The film is also fast-paced, as there is always something happening. What is happening may not be the most exciting or convincing thing ever put on celluloid, something is always on screen. Explosions galore, lots of blood, and some minor trappings of suspense filter through, and it does have some great action.The Bad News: Frankly, where to start. The effects, as mentioned above, could've been done more convincingly by a second-grader, the explosions are so cheaply made they cost more than the computer used to create them, and the dialog uttered by the "adults" in this film is so mind-nerving that a sledgehammer to the face might seem like a more tolerable activity are only a few things that frankly bugged the hell out of me. If you want more in depth reasons as to why this is, read the other comments on here. They cover it in much better detail and more accurately than I ever could.The Final Verdict: With juvenile effects, laughable dialog, and a pathetic creature, I know it's shocking that I had some good things to say about it. The only people I can really recommend this too are those that perform their own "Mystery Science Theater 3000" on the movies they watch or those that loved the 60's monster films and miss the charm in the creatures from then. Otherwise, stay away; that isn't an option.Rated R: Graphic Violence and some Language.

I did my best to watch this two hour fiasco. It combined the awful special effects and plot of the original "Blob," with an execrable boosting of the (outstanding in the original) screenplay of "Runaway Train." The only explanation for this movie is that someone needed to take a huge tax deduction and figured they'd combine it with a shot at hosting a casting couch. What an incredible stinker! Lou Diamond Phillips is anxious to show us why he will take any part, no matter how bad. Barry Corbin continues his career as a typecast creep, a U.S. Senator from Texas and plays it well. He should next do the lead role in the story of Trent Lott or Jesse Helms. The women in this flick all seem to have gotten their roles as consolation prizes in the Fay Wray Memorial screaming contest. Special effects are unbelievably bad. H.S. kids in film class in North Dakota could have done a better job. The writers must have pulled a heist at the cliché bank to accumulate this many. I couldn't watch any more without being forced to sit in the Clockwork Orange chair. I have no idea how it ended, except obviously, 119 minutes too late. Ugh! Caveat emptor.