Gary Sinise And Vincent D'Onofrio Starred In This Critically Savaged Philip K. Dick Sci-Fi Adaptation

Not every Philip K. Dick movie adaptation is created equal. Some flop hard even if they star Nicolas Cage; some showcase an all-star cast and satisfy critics yet go underappreciated, and some become timeless masterpieces we still talk about today. And then there are those that fall through the cracks entirely. "Kiss the Girls" director Gary Fleder's 2001 dystopia, "Impostor," belongs in that category. Despite featuring an imposing cast (especially for its time), including Gary Sinise, Vincent D'Onofrio, Madeleine Stowe, Mekhi Phifer, and Tony Shalhoub, this initially intriguing adaptation was pretty much dead on arrival.

Based on Dick's 1953 short story of the same name, "Impostor" takes you to the future of 2039, a dystopian and bleak landscape where Earth had been under attack by an alien species called the Centaurians (although there's no person who ever saw them). To defend human civilization, a totalitarian government is formed, and force field domes are implemented to protect larger cities and essentially to ensure the survival of our species.

Jump to 30 years later, you meet Spencer Olham (Sinise), a husband and arms designer for the government, whose life gets upended by an accusation from the Earth Security Administration (ESA), claiming he's a replicant sent by the Centaurians. The trouble is, there's almost no way to prove or disprove that. According to the ESA, replicants are immaculate biological copies of humans with implanted memories, even unaware of their real identity and programming. Thus, Olham is left with no other choice than to escape before they can lock him up, attempting to seek the help of his wife, Maya (Stowe), the only person capable of proving that he is, in fact, 100% human.

As usual, Dick's short story had some really compelling themes to explore, but even three screenwriters couldn't do it justice. Penned by Caroline Case, Ehren Kruger, and "Pitch Black" director David Twohy, "Impostor" was a mixture of much better movies done poorly. You can feel Twohy's "The Fugitive" in it as well as some vague influence from Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner," but all they do is highlight how derivative, cliched, and unexciting Fleder's movie is. And his lackluster, tasteless, and dull direction doesn't help its case much either.

The one thing that "Impostor" has going for it is its talented cast, doing tremendous work to improve upon its shortcomings, but ultimately, they can't save the film from landing as an utter failure. So it hardly comes as a surprise to anyone that "Impostor" was absolutely crushed by critics upon release (currently holding a 25% rating on Rotten Tomatoes), which consensus pretty much rang true for the moviegoers who went to see it, too. Made on a $30 million budget, "Impostor" barely managed to scrape together $8.6 million worldwide at the box office, flopping hard as hell (just like John Travolta's "Battlefield Earth," one of the worst movies ever made, a year prior).

Although Fleder's feature has found some minimal re-evaluation among sci-fi fans as a "not-as-bad-as-it-looks" flick people were too harsh on back in the aughts, those people are in the minority. "Impostor" is pretty terrible, and it became a dismissed relic of the past for a reason. If you're on the lookout for great Philip K. Dick movie adaptations, it's safe to say that you can skip this one without feeling bad.