Woodyanders Review of Syngenor

Syngenor (1990)

Enjoyable Grade B sci-fi/horror creature feature schlock

[8/10 · 15 January 2012]

The powerful multi-national corporation Norton Cyberdyne creates a deadly army of mutant soldiers called Syngenors that get loose and go on a murderous rampage inside the building. Director George Elanjian, Jr., working from a hilariously inane script by Brent V. Friedman, treats the silly premise with admirably misguided seriousness, relates the dippy story at a snappy pace, delivers a nice sprinkling of goopy splatter (there's a decent dab of tasty gratuitous bare distaff skin as well courtesy of one token topless blonde bimbo), and handles the action set pieces with a sidesplitting lack of competence (the monsters do these gut-busting herky-jerky robot chicken-style moves when shot!). The reptilian humanoid Syngenor beasts look pretty gnarly. Best of all, the late, great David Gale of "Re-Animator" fame positively galvanizes the proceedings with his fierce, intense, and gloriously loopy portrayal of paranoid and unhinged CEO Carter Brown, who injects glowing gunk in his neck, kills off most of his top executives when he thinks they've betrayed him, and flips his lid with deliciously unrestrained scenery-gnashing hammy panache. While Gale clearly dominates the whole show with his highly entertaining eye-rolling histrionics, the rest of the cast nonetheless acquit themselves well in their roles, with especially stand-out contributions by the ever-appealing Starr Andreeff as the spunky Susan Valentine, Mitchell Laurence as likable journalist Nick Cary, Riva Spier as the ruthlessly ambitious and treacherous Paula Gorski, and Charles Lucia as slimy yuppie Stan Armbrewster. Popping up in nifty bits are Lewis Arquette as amiable scientist Ethan Valentine and Melanie Shatner as cute underage secretary Bonnie Brown. Both James Mathers' slick cinematography and the lively hum'n'shiver score by Thomas Chase and Steve Rucker are up to par. A good deal of kitschy fun.