User Reviews

Sy Fy gets no respect when it comes to "Another Sy Fy original ....".

This one isn't so bad of a production. But the story really doesn't do any justice to the lore of the Philadelphia Experiment.

I come to Sy Fy channel for simple entertainment, and this movie was OK in this regard. Although I sincerely wish that one day somebody with Steven Spielberg caliber talent would create an Indiana Jones level expose film about the Philadelphia Experiment.

One thing I have to give this movie credit is that it's beautifully shot.

For a low budget movie it's well crafted, and my hats off to the producers for keeping the production quality high.

Not so compelling of a story, and that's the problem of this movie, but this is about the level of production I come to expect from "Another Sy Fy original ....".

A group of scientists trying to create a cloaking device accidentally conjure up the USS Eldridge, a ship that disappeared in 1943. Now their only priority is to send it back.

While I did not see the 1980s version of this story, I am familiar with what allegedly happened in real life. I think this is a fine plot of what could have happened, even if it does not necessarily make logical sense.

Director Paul Ziller is SyFy's go-to guy and has made quite a few of their productions now, with varying degrees of success. I feel like Ziller really has a handle on how to make a low-budget science fiction film, as he has the formula down. The weakest part is always the special effects (the computer-generated effects), which are out of his control.

Of course, this film also suffers from having Emilie Ullerup, one of the worst actresses in the history of the universe. Her character is a bit hard to believe (a world-class hacker working as a waitress in a small town diner), but even if we accept that, Ullerup just kept overacting repeatedly. I felt no sympathy for her and think the film would have been much better if her scenes were just cut out completely.

And why did the police officer wear jeans?

Bad acting, bad writing, bad effects, bad everything. Don't waste your time. You have been warned.

I had looked forward to this and I was so disappointed. What a wonderful movie the first was ..... and now this

Acting awful despite good actors .... must be the directors fault.

There are under-laying music during the whole movie which is properly the only way they thought they could get excitement up with the viewers.

Its just awful, awful, awful.

What a shame ....... it could really have been good

Why would anybody do this and spoil the memory of an excellent movie is pitiful.

This 2012 version of THE PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT is a failed reworking of the minor sci-fi classic that was the original. Gone is the military-focused, ship-bound storyline to be replaced by a generic 'government conspiracy' style tale, with lots of driving around and chatting as a couple of protagonists evade the generic bad guys.

The special effects are very limited and consist merely of a couple of 'electricity' effects which they really shouldn't have bothered with, as they're not very good. The hero duties are fulfilled by Nicholas Lea, who certain cult fans may remember playing Krychek in THE X-FILES, while the likes of Michael Pare and Malcolm McDowell prop up the cast. However, like a lot of low budget Canadian sci-fi movies in recent years, it's really not worth bothering with.

The Philadelphia Experiment (2012)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Decent remake of the 1984 film mainly just takes the basic plot and takes it into a new direction so those who loved the original movie and its love story can rest easy. In this version, a government agency is doing work on the original Philadelphia Experiment when something goes wrong and the ship Eldridge ends up floating around in time. The sole survivor (Nicholas Lea) ends up getting off the ship in 2012 and teams up with his granddaughter (Emilie Ullerup) to try and find out what's going on and how to stop it. I actually thought that the first hour of this film was better than anything in the original movie but sadly the final thirty-minutes start to go overboard but in the end we're still left with a fairly impressive movie and especially considering it aired on SyFy. What I enjoyed most about the first half is simply the confusion of the Bill Gardner character as he tries to figure out what went wrong in the 1943 experiment and how it has gotten him placed in 2012. I thought the early scenes between him and his granddaughter were quite entertaining and I thought the action scenes that followed with the two were well directed. The problem happens when the super secret government people start to show up with murder in their eyes and this is when the first loses its brain and fall off track. I'd say the superhuman powers that Gardner receives is also something that didn't work too well. I thought both Lea and Ullerup were extremely good in their roles and their performances made the film all the more enjoyable. Malcolm McDowell has a quite cameo but is a lot of fun and the original star Michael Pare is also on hand here so that should thrill fans of the 1984 film. I had just watched the original film days before this one and I said that the material was so strong that it really needed a bigger budget to fully capture everything it could. That didn't really happen with this movie as there's still something better that could come from the material but this here is still worth viewing.

This adaptation is loosely (very) based on the original story, one I've always been a fan of. The production values and effects are second rate and the script and acting are downright awful in places. Despite those things, I found it likeable. Nicholas Lea (Krycek from the X-Files) does a decent job in the lead and the story is fun engaging sci-fi. Seeing Michael Pare in this one (he had the lead role in the 1984 movie) playing a bad guy was entertaining too. I can see why fans of the legacy might not like it. I chose to see the silver lining.

Whilst ironing I figured I'd turn the TV on, this film was already on. Ever witnessed a car crash or someone fall over, you know it's going to be bad but you couldn't look away? This was like that. I watched it to the bitter end, it's flawed and cheesy, poorly edited and the soundtrack trite, I rate several of the actors in it but you can only do so much so I don't lay the blame at their feet as if the script is laughable and the director tells you to stumble down that corridor uttering scripted banalities then that's what you do. The original was much better with probably a much smaller budget and FX team so watch that instead. Trust me. Still, I did get my ironing done and that's something.

This was very solid for a SciFi Original. Actually, one of the best I've seen in quite some time.

Sure, the characters were one-dimensional and the plot made no sense, but did you really expect an Award-winning performance here? The movie was fast-paced, with some good special effects (the ship landing on top of a skyscraper was particularly effective) and soundtrack was kick-ass. It never got boring or tedious and I was curious to see how it would all end.

I have no clue whether this was a remake or a sequel to the original 1984 movie. And honestly, I don't care. I just watched it on its own and try to judge it as a standalone product. And as such, it was worth those 90 minutes of my life.

I want to give props to Nicholas Lea, the man can act, and he can really sell the role he's playing...even if he is in an absolutely horrible movie. So, big hats off to him for bringing his A-Game to this. He made the movie tolerable and I was actually able to finish it because of him.

However, well, the special effects showed too much. Had they hid it in the darkness more they could have saved money, made it look better, and it wouldn't have come across so much like a early 90s made for TV flick.

And it felt that good chunks of the script were written around the special effects and...that didn't help at all.

So the end result was a bad remake of a decent film (one that was clearly low budget and still managed to pull it off by NOT featuring a ton of FXs, with a horrible script...

...but a horrible script that had a fun cameo by Michael Pare for people like me...and a horrible script that Nicholas Lea still managed to sell despite having some of the dumbest and most misplaced lines imaginable.

Corniest movie I've ever seen - can't believe that Malcolm Macdowall would lend his name to this tripe.

Simply unbelievable sequences where a (seemingly) 30-35 year old woman can single handedly order nuclear attacks (OK OK - so she says the President authorized it - but dear me).

Not clear why they are trying to kill the main characters chasing them all over the countryside (despite the scientific advice that says don't do it).

Also when Carl finally gets off the ship by metamorphosing through the hull (how did he do that?) - there is Molly standing at that very point to meet him

To echo the words of another reviewer: dissappointing, awful, shame, pitiful. Michael Pare, the likable protagonist in the original film, plays an evil goon in this failed remake. Even Gina Holden's eye candy factor is overshadowed by the ridiculous character she has to play (the head evil goon in heels). Even Malcolm McDowell's presence as a "good guy" couldn't salvage this horrendous production. Just plain terrible acting and/or inept direction of this irritatingly drawn out, unsatisfying story in which the bad guys do by far most of the butt-kicking, leads to a stupidly insulting ending.

I may have seen worse acting, but I really can't remember when. I stumbled upon this on Amazon Prime, and frankly, that was one wasted evening I'll never get back. At least the 1984 version, while a bit corny, was entertaining.

This remake of the 1980s cult movie was doomed from the start. It was made by Canadian filmmakers (strike one!) with Cinetel Films (strike two!) for the SyFy network (strike three, you're out!) Now, I will say that the screenplay does have a few good ideas here and there, though they are minor details instead of something bigger. The screenplay as a whole is a mess, however - there are a lot of things that are simply not explained or are completely missing. The movie felt like a quick first draft instead of something that had been gone over many times to patch up any shortcomings. Though had the screenplay been better, the movie would have suffered from a shabby look. The movie looks real cheap, even the scenes that don't depend on special effects or sets. The original movie wasn't anything earth-shaking, but it was a lot better in every department you can think of.

Scientists in 2012 try to renew a 1940s experiment in Philadelphia that made a US Navy Warship, The USS Eldridge DE 173 disappear and reappear at will. The purpose in the early 1940s experiment was to create a cloaking device so that mines would not "see" the ship (remember, we were at war at this time).

In this movie, the scientists use a late model car for the experiment to see if they can cloak it. The problem occurs when the generators at the facility link to the generators on the Eldridge and make it appear and disappear. We are told in here that the Eldridge had completely disappeared back in the 1940s. In this movie, the Eldridge appears on a local airfield, on top of a building in Chicago, in a desert. and later back at the facility where we started (but we knew that would happen, right? Work with me).

Many including our government say the Philadelphia Experiment was a hoax. Go to Wikipedia and read up on everything.

But, here we are dealing with a movie produced and shown for our entertainment. And, very entertaining it was. Of course, this is not a comedy but some Hollywood comedic techniques (silly and stupid) are used. Witness the contractors in charge of this experiment who want to bomb the ship to stop its jumping to other locations causing panic and destruction. The ship is protected by an electrical shield that cannot be penetrated. See, silly and stupid in trying to bomb it.

Nicholas Lea as Bill Gardner is the key to the resolution of this problem and he does a fine job. Gardner was the Navy Lieutenant aboard the Eldridge when it started jumping from location to location. Nice to see Malcolm McDowell as Morton Salinger, one of the original scientists back in the 1940s ; and he is always a welcome sight in any movie. Ryan Robbins as Faulkner, the only sane, logical scientist who headed the experiment does an outstanding job in trying to do the right thing. Gina Holden as Kathryn Moore, the evil head of the contractors and she was totally evil (good job at it though). Emilie Ullerup as Molly, Bill Gardner's granddaughter, who uses a computer to help unravel Salinger's solution to the problem. And, then there is Michael Pare as Hagan, the contractor's hit man so to speak. Mr. Pare was one of the stars in the original 1984 movie of the same title, but in here he is a bad guy. Bummer.

The pacing is just right and the acting performances of all is quite good.

Oh, just so you know, hoax or not, the government gave the Eldridge to the Greek Royal Navy and its new designation is: HNS Leon D-54 . Hey, I looked it up.

You may enjoy the scene at the end when Molly enters her house and asks if anyone is home. (7/10)

Violence: Yes. Sex: No. Nudity: No. Language: No.

This is up there with the BEST of them. The best of CRAP that is...it looks like it was written by a 13 year old schoolboy and the editing isn't much better. The actors involved in this must've been damned hard up for cash because their talents are totally wasted on this poor excuse for entertainment.

I'm not going to spoil it because there is nothing to spoil. The studio did a fine job of that all by themselves.

Just don't waste your time. Watch a soapie or go out and hire an old 50's scifi. I'm sure they had a thing called continuity and good editing back then. It seems to be a dying art these days.

I was very surprised to view the made for TV movie on SCIFI channel sometimes their movies are kind of silly, but this one was very good. I have seen the original and the sequel with Michael Pare and loved them so I was a little hesitant to watch the remake, but to my enjoyment it was a very good movie. It is worth the 10 stars I gave it. It was good to see Michael Pare again even if he was a bad guy he looks pretty good considering his age. I kept hoping the witch government official Gina Holden would get what was coming to her, she really deserved it. Makes you wonder about certain sections of the so called government officials is true. Nicholas Lee did an outstanding job as the leading man. Macolm MacDowell is always wonderful to see in anything he is in.

I've seen a lot worse than this movie. It's sort of a remake of the old movie of the same name which was definitely better and more engaging. Still, it's visually gorgeous to see the destroyer fall from the sky. To add my own cliché to the movie's, I'd say they built them destroyers well in those days. Unfortunately, the movie is marred by the usual government killers trying to hush the whole thing down with bullets, which is ridiculous when the famous ship happens to fall down on the roof of a skyscraper in the middle of Chicago. It would have been nice to see a movie without this military idiocy let loose. Don't we have enough already in the real world? They could have done a better story with this but decided to go with the tried and wrong. Of course I knew from the start that the bad guys (and girl) would be dealt with and that the good guys (and gorgeous blonde)would make it through. The action is constant, though tedious at times. But we have one of the greatest inventions of all time: a remote with fast forward speed command.That helps wasting time faster. Still, I give it a 6. I have a strange nostalgia for old warships, even if I've never been on one.

I could not connect with the characters on any level keeping them strangers throughout the whole film. As good as the performers were with their respective characters the story appeared to fall short giving them that opportunity.

I failed miserably to comprehend a motivation behind many scenes that appear to depict blatant irrationality. As much as I value Michael Pare's work, I don't feel that the kind of killer he was screened to play really had a place in the film.

Although the complete retelling of a story so memorable is refreshing, I think it could have been much more successful without the killing and cold-hearted villainy.