Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The present state of independent action cinema is reflected in Phase IV, a formulaic tale that's competently shot but nothing special. The film was probably assembled as an investment - a straight-to-video non-release here, with whatever theatrical playoff can be sold in so-called undiscriminating foreign territories. The big film markets are always chock-full of shows like this looking for sales for territory rights. Phase IV is as generic a product as one can imagine, but less stupid than many.

First necessity: a star or two for the poster or video box. Dean Cain (Lois & Clark) plays a 30 year-old college football player (?) who also happens to be an investigative reporter for the "New England University." Naturally, he becomes the target for a ballooning conspiracy centered on an experimental AIDS drug that the "powers that be" don't want to come out into the open. Several student guinea pigs have died recently, and Cain's best friend, a research chemist, has been framed for one of the killings. Of course, it's all the work of a network of evil conspirators who use a rather noisy and out-in-the-open hit squad of Xtreme wackos to do the killings. You have to have a tongue stud to be a real hired thug these days. Led by a rogue detective (familiar action star Brian Bosworth), they frame those innocents lucky enough to escape being blow up, shot dead or hit by cars.

All of this is to insure that (gasp) a real AIDS cure doesn't hit the streets so that the EVIL pharmaceutical company can continue to sell "bandaid" symptom treatment drugs. This makes Phase IV a knuckle-headed action take on a theme that most Americans suspect is the truth anyway (although nobody ever believes in conspiracies when it comes to foreign wars...).

Don't think that Phase IV goes any deeper than the above synopsis as there's an action scene every ten minutes, that lasts about 8 & 1/2 minutes. An honest senator ends up helping our hero avoid the cops and corner the truth. There's lots of chases across an unnamed Canadian campus, and lots of helicopter work that makes Nova Scotia look like a beautiful place to visit.

The fights and car stunts are generic but moderately well-done, especially a truck wreck at about the twenty minute mark that mashes a pair of combatants. The opening has a car sink into the ice aided by so-so computer animation, so I'm guessing that some of the apparent jeopardy in the stunts might have been created by wire removal and other visual doctoring. It doesn't look bad for this sort of thing. In other words, the movie doesn't look cheap. It's like a network hour drama with more action.

The dumb climactic showdown takes place in a football stadium. Our hero tricks the bad guys with a really unlikely electrocution gag. So what if the hero is balancing on wooden crutches? With everything soaked in water, everybody would get a volt or two ... but probably just a tickle unless they were in direct contact with the wires. Acres of grass soak up a lotta electricity. And if everything's wet and electrified, how come all becomes immediately safe when the sprinklers stop?

Most of the acting is reasonable. Bosworth's role is dull but Dean Cain is likeable in a numbskull kind of way engineered to be acceptable in as many foreign markets as possible.

Key DVD and NuImage's Phase IV DVD is a good flat transfer of a film that was probably composed to be matted or shown full frame. The relatively high production values show in the good mix, good color and the overall quality of the effects, such as the de rigeur escape-a-billowing-fireball-by-leaping-in-slow-motion scene. There's a video promo labeled as a trailer and a second Spanish track, but no subtitles or closed captions.

The film is from 2003. Savant ordered it on foolish notion that it was Phase IV, the Saul Bass science fiction film from 1974.