''Project Shadowchaser'', also known as ''Shadowchaser'' and ''Project: Shadowchaser'', is a 1992

science fiction film Science fiction (or sci-fi) is a film genre that uses Speculative fiction, speculative, fictional science-based depictions of phenomena that are not fully accepted by mainstream science, such as Extraterrestrial life in fiction, extraterrestria ...

by director John Eyres. It is the first installment in the direct-to-video film series ''Project Shadowchaser''.

Synopsis

Armed terrorists, led by a super android named Romulus (Frank Zagarino), take over a high rise hospital with the president's daughter Sarah (Meg Foster) as hostage. The android has been corrupted by its government creator Kinderman (Joss Ackland). The FBI, led by Trevanian (Paul Koslo), gets the hospital architect, Desilva (Martin Kove), out of cryogenic prison and desperately asks for his help. Desilva has a criminal past, but is thought the only person who can find a way to design a surprise raid. However, a mistake is made and, instead of the architect, an ex-pro football player, serving "cryo-time" for murder, is revived. The football player pretends to be Dixon (the architect) to stay out of prison; however, when the FBI's plan goes wrong, Desilva must face the android alone.

Cast

Frank Zagarino Frank Zagarino is an American personal trainer and former actor, who starred in a number of low budget action movies. One of his early roles was in the movie ''Barbarian Queen'' (1985) in which he played opposite Lana Clarkson. Like several oth ...

as Romulus *

Meg Foster Margaret "Meg" Foster (born May 10, 1948) is an American film and television actress. Some of her many roles were in the 1979 TV miniseries version of '' The Scarlet Letter'', and the films '' Ticket to Heaven'', ''The Osterman Weekend'' and '' ...

as Sarah *

Joss Ackland Sidney Edmond Jocelyn Ackland (29 February 1928 – 19 November 2023) was an English actor who appeared in more than 130 film, radio and television roles. He was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for portraying ...

as Kinderman *

Paul Koslo Paul Koslo (born Manfred Koslowski; June 27, 1944 – January 9, 2019) was a German-born Canadian actor. Career Koslo started his career in such 1970s films as '' Nam's Angels'' a.k.a. ''The Losers'', ''Vanishing Point'' and '' The Stone Ki ...

as FBI Special Agent Trevanian *

Martin Kove Martin Kove (; born ) is an American actor and martial artist. He is best known for his role as John Kreese, the main antagonist of ''The Karate Kid'' (1984). Kove reprised the role in ''The Karate Kid Part II'' (1986), ''The Karate Kid Part III ...

as Desilva

Production

''Project Shadowchaser'' was shot at Pinewood Studios. Most of the set was reused from ''

Alien 3 ''Alien 3'' (stylized as ''ALIEN3'') is a 1992 American science fiction horror film directed by David Fincher and written by David Giler, Walter Hill, and Larry Ferguson, from a story by Vincent Ward. Starring Sigourney Weaver reprising her ...

''. The special effects supervisor on the film was Brian Smithies. Cinematographer Alan Trow had worked with director Richard Driscoll on an earlier film low budget film The Comic (1985). Work on that film led to a partnership with producer/director John Eyres on this and other action films.

Notability

The film was notable by the reunion of

and

, who previously worked together on the first season of

Cagney & Lacey ''Cagney & Lacey'' is an American police procedural drama television series that aired on the CBS television network for seven seasons from March 25, 1982, to May 16, 1988. The show is about two New York City police detectives who lead very dif ...

as Detectives Victor Isbecki and Christine Cagney, respectively, until Foster was replaced by

Sharon Gless Sharon Marguerite Gless (born May 31, 1943) is an American actress known for her television roles. She portrayed Maggie Philbin on ''Switch'' (1975–78), Sgt. Christine Cagney in the police procedural drama series '' Cagney & Lacey'' (1982–88 ...

for the remainder of the series.

Release

The film was released on videocassette in the summer of 1992 by Prism Pictures. Prior to August 4, 2015, the film had never been released onto region 1 DVD, until

Echo Bridge Home Entertainment Echo Bridge Entertainment was an American independent distribution company. It acquired and distributed feature films, scripted and non-scripted series, documentaries, and children's programming for home video, digital and television in the Unit ...

acquired the rights and released it through the Termination Collection, bundled with 4 additional movies as well. It had also popped up through AT&T U-Verse's screen pack, also under license from Echo Bridge.

Reception

Creature Feature gave the movie 3.5 out of 5 stars, praising the script as well as finding the action rousing. It also stated that this was better than many of its bigger budget counterpart. Moira, however, gave the movie one out of five stars, finding it "amazingly silly."

TV Guide TV Guide is an American digital media In mass communication, digital media is any media (communication), communication media that operates in conjunction with various encoded machine-readable data formats. Digital content can be created, vi ...

gave the movie one star, although it did like the twist ending revealing the terrorist true motives. The work of the director was found to be impressive but marred by unrealistic miniature effects Product Shadowchaser Review (1992) https://www.tvguide.com/movies/project-shadowchaser/review/129159/

References

External links

* {{Project Shadowchaser 1992 films 1992 science fiction action films American science fiction action films American independent films 1992 independent films Films shot at Pinewood Studios Films about terrorism Project Shadowchaser films 1990s English-language films 1990s American films 1992 science fiction films English-language science fiction action films English-language independent films