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.

Not even 20 minutes into this movie , and i have already seen scenes stolen from another movie. "Species" .The Car chase and down the side of the Hill was taken Directly From it. The editing is Bad ... the acting Horrid. Yet again proving that No Talent is Required.They Didnt even bother to Change the Hair color of the Woman jumping from the Same Blue Mustang before crashing into the Power Transformer.the Driver has Brown hair but the woman jumping out Has Blonde (The Stunt double for Natasha Hensstridge in Species)It is a shame that they apparently dont know how to use computers well enough to re-color the car and the Hair.After 20 minutes I decided it was not worth my time, and turned to something better... QVC ... Just kidding ... but even that would be better than this garbage

The title sequence features a space shuttle out in deep space which instantly reminded me of LIFEFORCE while the music used reminded me of ALIENS ( As one commentator suggested on this page it might actually be the soundtrack itself ) and all the way through PROJECT VIPER I couldn`t help but be reminded of set pieces I`d seen from other movies , but things go from bad to worse when an entire sequence is lifted from SPECIES , let me clarify that , the sequence didn`t remind me of SPECIES , it was stolen from the film itself and a couple of minutes later there`s another sequence stolen from AIR AMERICA ! I`ve said this before and I`ve saying it again : If you can`t make your own movie , then don`t bother making a movie . On top of all that because PROJECT VIPER uses action scenes from other peoples films the screenplay is very confused and disjointed