Name: Harbinger Down (2015)
IMDb: link to IMDb
Genres: SciFi, Horror Country of Origin: USA.
Cast: Lance Henricksen as Captain Graff, Camille Balsamo as Sadie, Matt Winston as Stephen, Winston James Francis as Big G (for Guillaume), Milla Bjorn as Svet, Giovonnie Samuels as Ronelle, Reid Collums as Bowman, Edwin H. Bravo as Atka, Michael Estime as Dock.
Written and directed by: Alec Gilles.
The Three Acts:
The initial tableaux: In 1982, a Russian manned probe re-enters Earth's atmosphere, something besides the cosmonaut is onboard. The probe ditches in the sea, to the north, near Alaska.
In current times, graduate student Sadie, professor and project leader Stephen, and lab tech Ronelle have a grant to study the effect of global warming on Beluga whales in the Arctic. Sadie's grandfather, Captain Graff, agrees to take the academics on his crab boat Harbinger to do the study. Graff and his crew (Dock, Svet, Big G, Atka, Bowman) will catch crab at night. The academics have the daytime to study the whales. Early in this process, they ping the lost probe, then bring it aboard. They discover the extra onboard was an engineered organism.
Delineation of conflicts: The organism is glad to be awake and have a lot to eat. Stephen wants full credit for the discovery, even though Sadie discovered it. The Russians, as it turned out, have a representative aboard to implement their strategy. The crew of the Harbinger want to survive the elimination derby.
Resolution: Will the Russians get their way? Will anyone of the original crew survive?
One line summary: Ripoff of The Thing (1982); not as good.
Statistics:
a. Cinematography: 6/10 OK, but muted to the extreme.
b. Sound: 8/10 Mostly fine.
c. Acting: 5/10 Lance Henriksen was good, as was Milla Bjorn. Reid Collums was OK, but Camille Balsamo and the rest were pretty bad.
d. Screenplay: 5/10 The plots and subplots moved along in pretty natural ways. Motivations were clear about most characters.
Final rating: 6/10
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