Title: Metal Shifters (AKA Iron Invader)
Directed by: Paul Ziller
Starring: Kavan Smith, Colby Johannson and Nicole de Boer
Running time: 90 minutes, Rated PG-13, Available on DVD
Space debris crash lands on a farm, coated with some sort of alien bacteria. Two brothers witness the crash and decide to cash in the metal to a junk yard owner who is in the process of creating a metal golem sculpture for the town’s centennial. The bacteria is attracted to metal, and attaches to the statue, bringing it to life and wreaking havoc on the small town.
The special features includes a behind the scenes featurette, where the actors themselves subtly admit that this film is crap, but they need work so they agreed to do it. Not their exact words, mind you, but it’s not that hard to read the truth in their sugar coated description of the film making experience. This has got to be one of the worst horror plots I have seen in awhile, and then the item in which to defeat the bacteria is just as lame and disappointing as the one in the movie Signs. SPOILER ALERT: It’s booze. One of the metal objects it takes over is an axe head, just the head. So it drags itself across the floor, but it’s very slow and of course our surviving cast members are having trouble outrunning and outwitting an axe.
The title of the film is very misleading. Shifters implies that the metal objects turn into something like “Transformers,” but it’s just some blue crap that looks like those metal shavings in a Wooly Willy pad being moved around and then they take over metal objects, killing people by sucking out the metals in their blood. If people have metal in their blood, why can’t they just take over the humans? That would’ve been a way better story. Where’s my movie deal?
Will I be giving this film a bad rating? Does a bear crap in the woods? (that line and more like it can be found in Metal Shifters!)
Total Rating: F
Reviewed by: JM Willis
