''The Shadow Men'' is a 1997 science-fiction thriller directed by

Timothy Bond Timothy Bond (born 1942) is a Canadian director and screenwriter. He normally does television, but has done films as well. He has done episodes of '' Due South'', '' The New Alfred Hitchcock Presents'', '' Star Trek: The Next Generation'', '' Sl ...

, and starring

Eric Roberts Eric Anthony Roberts (born April 18, 1956) is an American actor. He has amassed more than 700 film and television credits since his debut in 1978, making him one of the most prolific English-speaking screen actors of all time. Roberts' career ...

Sherilyn Fenn Sherilyn Fenn (born Sheryl Ann Fenn; February 1, 1965) is an American actress. She played Audrey Horne on the television series ''Twin Peaks'' (1990–1991, 2017) for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and an Emmy Award. She als ...

Dean Stockwell Robert Dean Stockwell (March 5, 1936 – November 7, 2021) was an American actor with a film and television career that spanned seven decades. As a child actor under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he appeared in '' Anchors Aweigh'' (1945), '' ...

and Brendan Ryan Barrett.

Plot

A married couple, Bob and Dez Wilson, and their 12-year-old son Andy are being accosted by a blinding light when driving home from a daytrip. They wake up a couple of hours later seemingly unscathed but soon experience recurring nightmares. It seems that they have been abducted by aliens, as is later proved by their son's Andy's

handycam Handycam is a line of camcorders made by Sony and introduced in 1985. Handycam was first used as the name of the first Video8 camcorder in 1985, replacing Sony's previous line of Betamovie, Betamax-based models of camcorders. The name was intend ...

that had suddenly started running right after the incident. This is also discovered by mysterious

Men In Black In popular culture and UFO conspiracy theories, men in black (MIB) are government agents dressed in dark suits, who question, interrogate, harass, and threaten unidentified flying object (UFO) witnesses to keep them silent about what they have ...

who start nagging the family up to the point of threatening to kill them. As they are laughed at by the

police The police are Law enforcement organization, a constituted body of Law enforcement officer, people empowered by a State (polity), state with the aim of Law enforcement, enforcing the law and protecting the Public order policing, public order ...

they seek refuge at

SciFi Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

-writer Stan Mills' house and start fighting back.

Reception

"In contrast to the glossy comedy ''

Men in Black In popular culture and UFO conspiracy theories, men in black (MIB) are government agents dressed in dark suits, who question, interrogate, harass, and threaten unidentified flying object (UFO) witnesses to keep them silent about what they have ...

'' that came out the same year, ''The Shadow Men'' is a relatively serious depiction of the legendary conspirators", according to

The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction ''The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'' (''SFE'') is an English language reference work on science fiction, first published in 1979. It has won the Hugo Award, Hugo, Locus Award, Locus and BSFA Award, British SF Awards. Two print editions appea ...

online.

Cast

as Bob Wilson *

as Dez Wilson *

as Stan Mills * Brendan Ryan Barrett as Andy Wilson *

Andrew Prine Andrew Lewis Prine (February 14, 1936 – October 31, 2022) was an American film, stage, and television actor. Early life Prine was born in 1936, in Jennings, Florida. He was raised in a farming community. Career Early beginnings In the ...

as MIB #1 * Chris McCarty as MIB #2 * Tom Poster as MIB #3 * Valerie Swift as Jane * Lisa Dinkins as the police desk sergeant

References

External links

* 1997 films Films directed by Timothy Bond American science fiction thriller films 1990s American films 1997 science fiction films {{1990s-US-film-stub