It appears that movie audiences have been fascinated with electronically enhanced soldiers for awhile now. Perhaps it all started in the sixties with the popular TV series, ‘The Bionic Man’ or may it goes back as far as the silent film days with the robot woman in ‘Metropolis’. No matter how the trend got started it is still very much alive and going strong. The idea of a person being half man and half machine holds a lot of potential for story lines. Just look what it did in ‘Star Wars’ where you have one of the best lines of dialogue ‘He’s more machine than man’. With such a character the writers can combine the unstoppable power of a machine with the conflicted emotional state of a human being. Usually the touchy feely aspect of story takes a back seat to the action that is possible as a super powered soldier run amok killing every bad guy in sight. One of the more recent flicks of this sort to come around is ‘Cyborg Soldier’ but you might have heard of it under the title ‘Weapon’. I guess the marketing people at the studio wanted to get that cyborg word in there for added audience appeal. When I received the screener for the DVD release I have to admit that I had a certain amount of trepidation. Like many fans of the Sci-Fi action genre I have seem more than my share of really bad renditions of this theme. This one wasn’t bad at all. It had enough of a plot to maintain the interest level between the action sequences which did require more in the way of attention than usual for this type of flick. The acting was not the greatest but it did hold together. As typical for a movie like this the lead actors were chosen for name recognition to help bring in the viewers. It is not a great film and will never be on any top film lists but it will make for an entertaining evening.

The script was provided by John Flock, Christopher Warre Smets and John Stead. Flock has had a career in a wide range of films as a producer and previous worked on the script for the drama ‘The Veteran’ and the Sci-Fi action flick ‘Fortress 2’. Smets’ experience has been in writing screenplays for a broad range of films that include dramas and comedies but with an emphasis on horror and thrillers. He also has experience in producing electron press kits to help promote films. This is an unusual way to get started in the business but you have to give credit for uniqueness. Stead, who also directed this movie, has a every interesting and appropriate background for a film like this. He has been a working stunt man since the early nineties appearing on many action oriented television series, many with a Sci-Fi slant. He also worked as an assistant director for a number of television shows including ‘The Dresden Files’ and ‘Earth: Final Conflict’. This is only his second script but he obviously knows his way around the genre from most possible angles. These men were able to produce a script that holds together as a solid story. This is refreshing considering most flicks like this just use the dialogue to provide the modicum of required exposition as a set up for the action. The characters are not so broadly drawn that they are indistinguishable from the other cyborg flicks.

The story centers on I.S.A.A.C. which stands for intuitive autonomous assault commando. The prototype, simply called Isaac (Rich Franklin) is the first in a panned line of new high tech human weapons. He was recruited death row with the promise of a change in his sentence if he permitted the extensive modifications. Those changes were applied to both body and mind. He is faster and stronger than a normal person with an amazing ability to regenerate. His mind is as quick a precise as a computer. He meets up with a local sheriff department officer, Lindsey Reardon (Tiffani Thiessen) and the pair wind up running from the project’s creator Simon Hart (Bruce Greenwood). This does allow the movie to get into the all too familiar chase flick but it is done with some intelligence and flair.

The movie starts off with some action; just to draw you in. the first shot is a flashing red light with an alarm blaring in the background. From the outside the building looks like any other warehouse and office but inside is a high security and obviously top secret military laboratory. A large group of soldiers are shown running into level nine, the most restricted section of the facility. Isaac appears determined to leave the place but he small army that is trying to stop him might has well have been a Girl Scout troop. He walks away with a trail of bodies behind him. Cut to a lonely road where Lindsey is sitting in her squad car checking for speeders. There is a cross hanging from the rear view mirror; the universal sign for a religious person in movies. The speed trap she is on is not yielding much in the way of action. The only hit Lindsey gets on her radar gun is six mph, a passing tractor. She gets a call from the station about a report of a military type trespasser on a nearby farm. Unbeknownst to them the call has been intercepted by a man in with some sophisticated monitoring devices. The man in question has ducked into the ‘old 48’, a deserted area that is difficult to get out of. Lindsey goes off to find him and the sinister surveillance truck takes off for the same location. Back at the facility Hart is not al all happy to learn of the escape of his prototype. He does seem inwardly pleased that he fought so well especially how precise his attacks were. Making it a really bad day for Hart is a visitor from the Senate Oversight committee, Janice Fraser (Wendy Anderson). She wants an explanation of the progress the extremely expensive prototype is making. Bad goes to worse when she tells Hart that she knows about the escape. A super enhanced ex convict on the loose is not the kind of thing that goes over well in either military or political circles. Meanwhile the men in the van, all dressed in black with ominous tattoos, get out searching for Isaac. The cybog meets up with Lindsey and reluctantly she agrees to help him evade the men in black.

The movie is well paced; moving along in such a fashion as to grab the audience from the start. The actors are professionals and know how to sell a role even in a smaller movie like this one. Franklin is a former UFC Middle weight champion and looks the part nicely. It was a great idea to get someone other than the usual overly bulky heavy weight for the cyborg. Franklin looks not only strong enough but fast enough for the part. Thiessen does well as Lindsey and is able to show herself as a strong and independent woman but with the right touch of damsel in distress still there. Greenwood is one of those actors that always give the best possible performance. Here is does a very good job of being the scientist who started it all. What is different about his presentation of this type of character is he gives a more human side to him. It appears that Hart wanted to do something positive, to help lessen the risk of battle but things went wrong.

This is a worth while film that is fun to watch. It is rated PG-13 so it would make for a nice Saturday evening family film just leave the youngest members of the family at the grandparents. The DVD is released by First Look Studio and once again they come up with a smaller film that deserves notice.