Repligator (1996) — Triskaidekafiles

REPLIGATOR

WRITER: Keith Kjornes

Additonal material by Wynn Winberg and T.G. Weems

DIRECTOR: Bret McCormick

STARRING: Gunnar Hansen as Dr. Kildare

Keith Kjornes as Dr. Oliver

Randy Clower as Dr. Fields

TJ Myers as Dr. Hardy

Carl Merritt as Col. Sanders

Rocky Patterson as Col. Sargeant

Alan York as General Mills

Tyler Mason as West

QUICK CUT: Military experiments go awry and turn soldiers into women. And then there's alligator people. Somehow. Cover up poor Science's eyes, he doesn't wanna see this.

THE MORGUE

Dr. Oliver - A determined scientist trying to create a telepo...a replicator to more easily move our soldiers around battlefields. He's smart, and driven, but not quite in the evil scientist way.

Dr. Fields - That's this guy's job! His main thrust is developing brainwashing technology, and he's more than willing to use anyone to get what he wants.

Dr. Hardy - Oliver's assistant, a not very attractive (for movies) scientist, who is shy, meek, and quiet, but doesn't take any crap when she's backed against a wall.

Dr. West - The counterpart to Dr. Hardy, he works with Fields on the brainwashing project. He's dorky with a terrible overbite, but harbours several secrets that won't stay hidden.

Private Waring - Oliver's original test subject, who does not come out the other end of the replicator the same as he went in. He follows orders, he's not the brightest crayon in the box, but he's a good soldier.

THE GUTS: This movie sets off my warning bells almost immediately, for no particular reason. I mean, besides the trailer, and the DVD cover, and the cheesy music right from the start, and the cardboard sets straight out of Doctor Who...

But anyways, we get the ball rolling with a Private Fodder being the first person to test out the Sexual Hologram Interface Terminal...heeeey. The S.H.I...HEEEEYYY!!!

WHY is this a military experiment? What application could it have? I shouldn't be asking these things so soon!

The doctor explains that the device will zap his brain to increase his libido and then his sexual thoughts will be broadcast to a nearby tv.

FOR SCIENCE!!

And that's also not what a hologram is, but hey, who am I to knock a clever anagram?

Cue the nudity and typical male fantasies! But at least the system...works? I guess? It confirmed men are horndogs? Again, the point was...?

Repli the gator goes chomp, chomp, chomp...

For some reason the credits have a dancing anime girl in camo doing army stuff. I got nothin', but if tentacles show up, I am out.

After that weirdness, a colonel busts into the lab, waving around a newspaper exposing his experiments to the world, and starts yelling at Dr. Leatherface.

To keep Colonel Sanders (I AM NOT JOKING) distracted, he shows him a pair of real, working x-ray specs. For more nudity! And SCIENCE!

The Google Glass prototypes didn't look that much dumber from the released version.

But we then jump to the source of Sanders' ire, another lab where Colonel Sargeant and General Mills are checking out the Replicator project. Fortunately, they have higher production values at the other lab. Meaning, they have a sliding automatic door!

Another doctor gives an overly technobabbly response that doesn't make a lick of sense, mainly because it's utter made up BS. So they ask Dr. Oliver to sum it up differently, and he just says, "Star Trek transporter". Now see, I can actually see the military applications here.

Which begs the question of, "Why is it called a replicator, then?" but I digress.

So they bring in a soldier to test the device out, and he starts losing his "Yes sir!" rhetoric the moment he hears anything about mortal danger. Smart man. And uh, can we maybe not test this while he's holding a gun filled with bullets? If there's 'mortal risk' maybe not carrying something with mini explosions in it is a bad idea?

They unplug the replicator, and the doors to the other room open up, so Private Waring can walk back in to show the experiment was a success. Or, they'll find a puddle of Waring pudding... Fortunately, that doesn't happen, but it's not a perfect experiment since a woman steps into the room dressed in Waring's clothes and carrying his weapon.

...Success?

Naturally, Mills flips out over this, and Oliver tries to defend himself saying they tested it on lab rats, and YOU try and figure out what sex a lab rat is! Hey, pal, guess what? That's actually part of your job, and something you SHOULD be able to do!

They try desperately to justify how the experiment could turn a man into a woman, and it's about as much gibberish as you could imagine. Something about how the process stretches DNA, and because it was stretched, the male part was stretched right out. Or something.

Private Waring asks for a meeting with Olvier since he's noticing something isn't right. Ya think? The problem he's having is that he suddenly finds men very attractive. He has *zero* awareness that her body has changed in the experiment. ...Not the most observant private, I guess.

Meanwhile, Doctor Fields is having trouble with his brainwashing experiments, but convinces one of the Mills that if he's given complete control over the Replicator project, he can mix in his mind control during the process and somehow overwrite the brain before they're transported. Because what could possibly go wrong there?

We jump back to Doc Leatherface as Sanders asks if there were any other secret experiments, and he tells us about the S.H.I.T, and...NOOO! The movie rewound to the start of the film! Not again! make it stoooop!

No joke, they seriously replay the ENTIRE first three minutes of the film, with no difference. That is the most heinous overuse of padding ever. We heard this already, it has NOTHING to do with the rest of the story AT ALL. It is there for padding and boobs. NOTHING. ELSE.

Back to something that passes for a plot, I love that while Oliver is losing control of his project, he still tries to find the upside to his failure, saying that the Normandy invasion would've gone much smoother with 50 thousand blonde bimbos. Gotta find that silver lining!

Meanwhile, Waring is getting some help with figuring out what happened, and wants to know why they don't just send him back through the machine, but it only produces female results. Convenient.

Hardy tries to help Waring figure this all out, and they have set her up as...not very attractive. It's gonna be the "Take off glasses, let down hair" type of hotness reveal, I'm sure, but they also slapped on this gigantic mole that will go away. So Waring suggests, why not go through it herself to make herself hotter?

Fields has taken over, and is interfacing his brainwashing tech with the replicator project, and they retrieve Waring to run him through the process a second time. Now, it's important to note that they have established it is not to undo the process. That can't be done with the machine as is. This is purely for the purpose of BRAINWASHING THIS POOR VICTIM.

Skeev alert approaching dangerous levels.

West makes a snarky comment, and the doctor just isn't gonna put up with insubordination, so throws him through the replicator. Wow. Just...Wow. What a guy.

Doctor Hardy tries to stop it, and oh! Oh oops! By total and complete accident she too trips through the device! Oh no, the woman thinking about hotifying herself just so happened to fall through!

The machine can't handle three subjects at once yet (Way to go, Fields!) and the building begins to shut down completely. Oliver does his best to try and get everyone out of the pattern buffer before they're lost for good in a power outage.

Emergency power comes back on, but they're still trapped in the building as a safety precaution. Good way to keep everyone contained when the plot starts going wrong!

Doctor Hardy is the first one to walk back into the room, and she wore surprisingly little under her labcoat. Pretty much the bare minimum. And yep, she's hotter, in just the way I figured.

Oh, and she is all *over* Doctor Oliver. All thanks to Fields' brainwashing. Ugh. Thanks for demolishing free will, I guess?

Private Waring didn't change any further physically, but he and Doctor West (Now a woman as well, naturally) have also been reprogrammed with Fields' handy dose of rampant nymphomania.

Waring drags off General Mills for some *cough* testing, and Oliver at least has the idea of using his newfound power over Hardy so he can command her to fix the device. Well, that's something at least.

Oliver confronts Fields over the brainwashing, and the science bullshit gets even worse when he says that with sending people through the machine plus the brainwashing, it could create a genetic time bomb.

Before this devolves into a late night Skinemax softcore porno, a scream draws some attention, and Oliver and Fields arrive just in time to see General Mills stumble out with a slashed throat, soon followed by his attacker, the now very transformed Private Waring.

So, that happened. That is one hell of a genetic time bomb. A real blast from the primordial past. The entire project is a T-wrecks. It is absolutely pterribledactyl. Should I stop now that these puns have made you dino-sore?

At a whopping 48 minutes in, we officially have Repligators! The scariest part in all this? David Icke was RIGHT! Noooo!

How bad can this really be, though? She should still be brainwashed, right? To be totally crazy nymphomaniacally in love with the dominant male? ...Oh wait, I guess that WOULD be worse. Since she's an alligator.

"That's it! The replicator stretched out her genetic code again! It stretched her back to pre-human influences!" ...SCIENCE!

"When you programmed her with rampant nymphomania, you created a sex charged object of desire! She experienced a prehistoric orgasm, which stretched her genetic code, creating the creature we now have to deal with!" .........SCIENCE!

These quotes say more about the movie than any mocking I ever could. WHAT IN THE NAME OF CHARLES BAND IS A PREHISTORIC ORGASM?!

The government finally shows up with its goon squad, just as the Waringsaur breaks into the replicator lab. They try and get it between the cones to run it through once more, but instead shoot it with a device that Hardy and West came up with, instantly zapping the dino soldier into the buffer.

...Huh. 30 minutes left to this movie, and this happens? Something has to go catastrophically wrong soon.

When the general and his men bust in, the women immediately turn on them and zap them into the machine's buffer as well. Uhhh. I'm gonna hope that their new superbrains that fixed the machine have also fixed that little disastrous crashing problem it had just from three people.

For some reason, the machine spits out Waring, back to female levels of normal, and it also spits out one of the goons, who has *ahem* spontaneously orgasmed himself into a dinosaur. I'm just shaking my head at this point.

Fields gets a gun and zaps West into the machine, but loses his juice before he can banish anyone else to the black hole. Oliver and Hardy bolt to try and fix things, with some issues from the brainwashing still affecting Hardy.

Oliver gets frustrated to the point he shoves her away violently, but it's okay! She hit her head and broke the brainwashing!

Which leads to even more crappy technobabble about how they can fix this by using genetic memory to brainwash people back into their normal selves. Yes, you heard me. Brainwashing to fix their sex changes because they remember being male.

They rush off to fix things and ask what else can go wrong, which is the cue for Colonel Sargeant to rise from the dead as...as...a...zombie.

Nono, I shall struggle through this.

Meanwhile, the rest of the soldiers are being spat out in their dinosaur forms, and Waring has an orgasm so she can join her friends and play.

Fields tells them to stop, and realises he still has control over them via his brainwashing. Hopefully the sex part didn't stick, because this could get messy.

"Apparently the bite from a gator babe produces a zombie like trance!" ...SCIENCE!

Oh, he's apparently also a gay zombie. Nnngh.

And then Hardy gets excited and transforms too, because we gotta get a dinosaur in stockings and a bra.

Does my new alligator skin dress make me look fat?

So Oliver runs off with the program to fix all this, and runs right into Fields and his army of gatorbabes. And they're all wearing sweats and sandals, so I can't take them seriously at all.

Okay, I never could, but that does not help in the slightest.

The doc grabs a plank and starts cracking the dinos over the head with it, knocking them out. Least effective army ever. But awesomest game of Whack-a-Mole.

Since he discovered that causing brain damage fixes the brainwashing, because SCIENCE, all the gatorbabes go after Fields, giving Oliver the chance to reach the replicator device.

Fields keeps trying to zap them with the replicator gun, but it keeps shorting out the power. Oh, there's an erectile dysfunction joke lurking here.

Oliver arrives just in time for West to be spat back out, and tries to convince her to help him load the repair data, but it turns out West likes being a woman, and doesn't want to change back.

The whole 'next time you have sex and you'll turn into an alligator' part helps convince her though, and Oliver promises to change her back into a woman once everything is sorted out.

Mummenschanz has really gone to crap in recent years.

Suddenly, the power issues are fixed, and the two doctors start zapping the rampaging gator babes, but the machine's working, more or less, and keeps spitting them back out. We kinda get stuck into a shooty, zappy loop for awhile.

Eventually, everyone wanders into the lab, gets zapped, and spat back out the way they were, even the gay zombies.

Things go to hell, and the lab explodes. We pick back up three plus months down the road, with Colonel Sanders meeting with Oliver on a backroad somewhere for a deal. They never really say WHAT Sanders is buying, but I guess he wants the data and programming for the replicator brainwasher.

Fire it up!  Fire it up! — Fire it up! Fire it up!

But briefcases exchange hands, and the two men go on their way, dragging out the movie just long enough to reach a decent time.

Oliver heads over to West's place to repay his debt, and to fix Dr. Fields, if that's what West wants. There's some blathering about how there was a protection file in the brainwasher that Fields installed to protect himself, so he was spat out as a woman. But it's fixed now, so whatever.

Also, he finds Hardy, and pretties her up again, and the movie misses a golden opportunity. All through this thing, Oliver has been telling people, 'You talk too much!" So when he tells Hardy of his plans to open a beauty shop, she naturally tells *him* before shagging, "Shut up!" No! No! You have her turn his phrase back on him and...oh, never mind.

The movie struggles for an ending as Sanders and Doc Leatherface chat some more, and we learn Leatherface has been making more replicator babes, with a second blaster. There's more gender swapping, they fight over the gun, and end up transformed themselves.

So after 90 minutes of bad science, bad alligators, bad special effects, and the biggest pile of cheese, the movie crashes to an ending. And no one gets a happily ever after here, damnit. There is naught but pain here.

AUTOPSY REPORT

Video: It leaves quite a bit to be desired, but isn't terrible. When it's dark, it hides a lot of the cheap flaws of the film, and they really shoulda stayed there more. Running through a well-lit office space...looks like running through someone's offices. And kills any possible horror of running from a bipedal alligator.

Audio: All right, pretty much matching the quality of the video. Everything gets the job done, and little more.

Sound Bite: "If you have a sexual experience, you will turn into a walking alligator!"

Body Count: This is the one thing that could've saved this movie, and it ended up being SORELY lacking. You would think ravenous, horny alligators would tear through people, but nope. Just grab a two by four...

1 - 48 minutes in, and General Mills (Or is it Colonel Sergeant?) gets his throat slashed by a humanoid dinosaur.
2 - One of the lower level canon fodder doctors dies at the hands of a repligator. Of course, they both come back as gay zombies and are reverted at the end of the movie, so the sum deaths is nil.

Best Corpse: Well, we barely see random dude whose name I can't be bothered to remember, so I guess it's the General.

Blood Type - F+: And that is only because of at least an attempt was made to do reptile effects. They were still pretty bad and stiff, but hey.

Sex Appeal: Lots of naked women scampering around.

Drink Up! Just crack open the bottle when the movie starts, and keep going.

Movie Review: Ow. Ow ow ow. What even IS this movie? Who is it for?? This is an important question. The horror is nonexistant, and that's fine. It's got some okay moments. But then it is SO clearly trying to be a Skinemax softcore movie, it gets in the way of the horror. BUT! They so want to actually tell a story, and actually have the monsters rampaging a bit, that while there's frequently topless women, they actually go to great lengths to stay AWAY from getting too porny. If they actually made up their mind and went one way, or the other, even if that way is into the late night Skinemax family, there might actually be something here. Instead, the movie gets close to anything interesting on ANY front, and then goes in the other direction again. It's trying to be too much, and ends up failing at everything. As for how the movie is for a story, and direction, and production...well, I'm sure y'all can figure that out. The production values are *laughable* and the plot is so filled with barely justifiable technobabble... Terrible, terrible movie! One out of five gatorbabes.

Entertainment Value: I'm not sure where to go with this. The movie SO clearly DOESN'T CARE about any of the above, and it knows it, and just ploughs ahead to do whatever the hell it wants. They are having fun, mostly. Things could stand to get a little cheesier, but I love the ludicrousness of EVERY DAMNED THING in this movie. It really is like watching a terrible Doctor Who story from the classic series, but with more boobs. I'd almost say watch this just for the entertainment value alone, because damn if it isn't something unique. So, for the movie that almost made me want to walk away and stop writing any more words, I give you a three out of five broken chair legs to hit gaterbabes with.