When a ship arrives in the Illinois river, carrying multiple cargo and missing its entire crew, two detectives are assigned to investigate and after searching, uncover a gruesome scene. Meanwhile, a biologist at Chicago's Museum of Natural History receives two crates from a fellow colleague, one with a statue inside, and the other with seemingly nothing. Soon, a security guard at the museum is murdered, and everyone slowly realizes that something may have been harbored in that ship that was best left undiscovered...something not entirely human.
When I was younger, I would often confuse 1997's The Relic and 1998's Mimic with one another. Perhaps because both films came out within six months from one another, or because both have an emphasis on science to explain its monsters, or maybe because both films end with "ic"s and have two syllable titles. Knowing the younger, stupider me, it was probably the latter.
The film stars Penelope Ann Miller (before she essentially disappeared from mainstream cinema) and Tom Sizemore (before he was filming cameos in ICP films...seriously) as our resident scientist and hero cop respectively. They both deliver solid performances, and it makes me sad that Miller hasn't gotten more work in the horror field. She's like a more competent Mira Sorvino, or like a more lively Gillian Anderson, though maybe not as appealing on the eyes for the male demographic. The exchanges between them and the rest of the cast are delivered with some actual conviction, despite a lot of the dialogue being VERY exposition-heavy.
Two more distinguishable traits for the film are Gale Ann Hurd (Aliens, The Terminator) producing and Stan Winston's crew providing makeup and creature effects throughout its almost two hour running time. The monster itself isn't revealed until around the eighty minute mark, playing out similar to what was done in Alien with showing the audience only glimpses until the big payoff. The monster itself certainly looks menacing, if not average in terms of actual thought put behind the design, but it is a bit hard to make out considering how damn dark the film is. It didn't reach the same level of annoyance as a film like AVP: Requiem did, but it can be frustrating for those viewing it in a room with little to no way of blocking light from entering.
I was pleasantly surprised with this one. While I certainly wasn't expecting total garbage (despite what some of the later choices on my list will tell you), I didn't expect to have this much fun. It's fairly underrated and its surprisingly smart script (based originally on a novel by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child) could hold your attention. The blood and gore, for what there is, is also well done. Give it a whirl.
Tomorrow, I hold Kevin Smith's words near and dear and decide to check out PHANTOMS.
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