Species is a 1995 science fiction horror film directed by Roger Donaldson, and starring Ben Kingsley, Michael Madsen, Alfred Molina and Forest Whitaker. The film is about a group of scientists who try to track down and trap a killer alien seductress before she successfully mates with a human male.

The film produced one theatrical sequel in 1998, Species II, which had Henstridge, Madsen, and Helgenberger reprise their roles. It was followed by the direct-to-video Species III in 2004 and Species: The Awakening in 2007, which stands as a separate film, not as an official follow-up to the previous three.

Plot[link]

Earth's scientists send out transmissions with information about Earth and its inhabitants, DNA structure, etc., in hopes of finding life beyond Earth. They then receive transmissions from an alien source on how to create endless fuel effortlessly. Therefore, the scientists assume that this is a friendly alien species. But from a second alien transmission, the scientists receive information about an alien DNA along with instructions on how to splice it with human DNA. A government team led by Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley) goes forward with the genetic experiment hoping to induce a female with "more docile and controllable" traits. The alien is the result of the SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) program. One of the hundred experimental ova produces a girl named Sil, who looks like a normal human but develops into a 12-year old in 3 months.

Sil's violent outbursts during sleep make the scientists consider her a threat. They try to kill her using cyanide gas but instead she breaks out of her containment cell and escapes. The government assembles a team composed of anthropologist Dr. Stephen Arden (Alfred Molina), molecular biologist Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger), empath Dan Smithson (Forest Whitaker) and mercenary Preston "Press" Lennox (Michael Madsen) to track and destroy Sil. Sil matures rapidly into an adult (Natasha Henstridge) in her early twenties and makes her way to Los Angeles. This makes tracking her extremely difficult. She is incredibly strong and intelligent with amazing regenerative powers. The scientists fear she may mate with human males and produce offspring that could eliminate the human race. Sil lacks inhibitions when it comes to killing people who get in her way and wants to produce offspring as soon as possible. She frequently morphs into her alien form, a bipedal creature with tentacles on her shoulders and back.

Sil tries first to mate with a man she meets at a night club, but after sensing that he is diabetic, rejects and kills him by puncturing his skull with her tongue. She then tries to mate with a man she meets after a car accident. They swim in the man's pool where Sil forces the man to open his swimming trunks in order to mate, but the man refuses. This is interrupted by Press and Laura. She kills the man and flees naked into a forest without being seen by the team. She pretends to be a rape victim, and then proceeds to kidnap a woman. She fakes her death by crashing the woman's car into a tree during a high-speed chase.

After cutting and dyeing her hair, she takes an attraction to Press and attempts to seduce him. She eventually copulates with Arden; then kills him when he realizes who she is and what he has done. The rest of the team then follow her into the sewers where Fitch is subsequently killed and the area where she and her offspring are destroyed. Press uses a grenade launcher on Sil, blowing her head off. The trio leaves the area. The last scene shows a rat chewing on one of Sil's severed tentacles; it starts to mutate into a vicious beast and attacks another rat.

Cast[link]

• Ben Kingsley as Xavier Fitch
• Michael Madsen as Preston "Press" Lennox
• Alfred Molina as Dr. Stephen Arden
• Forest Whitaker as Dan Smithson
• Natasha Henstridge as Sil
• Marg Helgenberger as Dr. Laura Baker
• Michelle Williams as Young Sil
• Whip Hubley as John Carey

Production[link]

The creature was created and designed by Swiss artist H. R. Giger, who also created the creatures in the Alien films.

Novelization[link]

Written by Yvonne Navarro from the original screenplay, the book gives several in depth details about the characters not seen in the film, such as Sil's ability to visualize odors and determine harmful substances from edible items by the color. Gas appears black, food appears pink, an unhealthy potential mate appears to give off green fumes. Other character details include Press's background in tracking down AWOL soldiers as well as the process of decoding the alien signal. Although no clues are given as to its origin, it is mentioned that the message was somehow routed through several black holes to mask its point of origin.

Parts of these extra scenes and details are shown in the comic book adaptation by Titan Books. There is also a novelization by Navarro for Species II which follows the film's original screenplay with added scenes.

Reception[link]

Species received mixed however mainly negative reviews. It currently holds an approval rating of 36% at Rotten tomatoes based on 30 reviews (12 positive, 18 negative).^[2] Roger Ebert gave the film 2 out of 4 stars, criticizing the film's plot and overall lack of intelligence.^[3] Cristine James from Boxoffice magazine gave the film 2 out of 5 stars, describing it as "... 'Alien' meets 'V' meets 'Splash' meets 'Playboy's Erotic Fantasies: Forbidden Liaisons,' diluted into a diffuse, misdirected bore."^[4] James Berardinelli gave the film 2 and a half out of 4 stars, stating "as long as you don't stop to think about what's going on, Species is capable of offering its share of cheap thrills, with a laugh or two thrown in as well".^[5]

References[link]

1. ^ "Species". Box Office Mojo. http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=species.htm. Retrieved February 3, 2010. 
2. ^ "Species". Rotten Tomatoes. http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/species/. Retrieved February 3, 2010. 
3. ^ Ebert, Roger (July 7, 1995). "Species". Chicago Sun-Times. http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19950707/REVIEWS/507070303. Retrieved February 3, 2010. 
4. ^ James, Christine (August 1, 2008). "Species". Boxoffice. http://boxoffice.com/reviews/2008/08/species.php. Retrieved February 3, 2010. 
5. ^ Berardinelli, James. "Species". Reelviews.net. http://www.reelviews.net/php_review_template.php?identifier=192. Retrieved February 3, 2010. 

External links[link]

• Species at the Internet Movie Database
• Species at AllRovi
• Species at Box Office Mojo
• Species at Rotten Tomatoes

For other persons named Christopher Young, see Christopher Young (disambiguation)

Christopher Young
Christopher Young, May 2007
Background information
Born	(1958-04-28) April 28, 1958 (age 54) Red Bank, New Jersey, USA
Genres	Film score
Occupations	Composer
Years active	1982–present
Website	http://www.christopher-young.com/

Christopher Young (born April 28, 1958) is an American music composer for both film and television.^[1]

Many of his music compositions are for horror films, including Hellraiser, Tales from the Hood, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge, Urban Legend, and Drag Me to Hell. Other works include Lucky You and Spider-Man 3, for which he received the Film & TV Music Award for Best Score for a Dramatic Feature Film. He also made three cameo appearances in Spider-Man 3.

Young was honored with the prestigious Richard Kirk award at the 2008 BMI Film and TV Awards. The award is given annually to a composer who has made significant contributions to film and television music.^[2]

Life and career[link]

Young was born in Red Bank, New Jersey. He graduated from Hampshire College in Massachusetts with a Bachelor of Arts in music, and then completed his post-graduate work at North Texas State University. In 1980, he moved to Los Angeles. Originally a jazz drummer, when he heard some of Bernard Herrmann's works he decided to become a film composer. He studied at the UCLA Film School under the famous David Raksin. He later taught at the Thornton School of Music of the University of Southern California.^{[citation needed]}

Filmography[link]

Film[link]

1980s[link]

1990s[link]

2000s[link]

2010s[link]

• Priest (2011)
• Box of Shadows (2011) (theme only)
• The Rum Diary (2011)
• Sinister (2012)
• Scary or Die (2012)
• The Baytown Disco (2012)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Christopher Young at the Internet Movie Database

Natasha Henstridge
Henstridge at a Canadian Film Centre & Variety-hosted reception for the Telefilm Canada Features Comedy Lab
Born	Natasha T. Henstridge (1974-08-15) August 15, 1974 (age 37) Springdale, Newfoundland, Canada
Years active	1995–present
Spouse	Damian Chapa (1995–1996) Darius Campbell (2011–present)
Partner	Liam Waite (1996–2004)

Natasha T. Henstridge (born August 15, 1974) is a Canadian actress and former fashion model. Her most notable on-screen roles include Species, The Whole Nine Yards, It Had To Be You, Ghosts of Mars, She Spies, the TV series Eli Stone, and the Canadian TV mini-series Would Be Kings, for which she won the Gemini Award for best actress. Her most recent regular role is as Dawn Chamberlain in the TV series The Secret Circle.

Early life[link]

Henstridge was born in Springdale, Newfoundland, the daughter of Helen Henstridge, a homemaker, and Brian Henstridge, a construction manager and business owner.^[1][2] She was raised in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada with her younger brother, Shane.

Modeling career[link]

At the age of 14, Henstridge entered the Casablanca Modeling Agency's "Look of the Year" contest and was chosen first runner-up. The following year, she went to Paris to pursue her modeling ambitions. At 15, she was featured on her first magazine cover, the French edition of Cosmopolitan. Several more magazine covers followed and Henstridge went on to do television commercials for products such as Olay, Old Spice, and Lady Stetson. Her modeling career established, Henstridge moved on to a career in movies.

Film[link]

In her 1995 film debut Species, Henstridge played Sil, a genetically engineered alien/human hybrid created from a message received by SETI, who breaks free from the captivity of a laboratory. Pursued by a team of experts who band together to stop her before she multiplies, Sil embarks on a killing spree while also discovering her powerful instinct to mate. Species was an instant hit, making $113 million (USD) at the box office.^[3] Notable for its sexual content, the film won Henstridge the MTV Movie award for "best kiss" for a scene in which her character, while kissing an aggressive would-be suitor, impales his head on her tongue. In 1998, she played Eve, a more ambiguous genetic duplicate of Sil, in Species II, which was a failure at the box office.

A few smaller independent movies followed, including Bela Donna and Dog Park, with varied box office returns. Henstridge starred opposite Jean-Claude Van Damme in the action/adventure movie Maximum Risk. She also starred in the 2000 film The Whole Nine Yards and its 2004 sequel The Whole Ten Yards. Despite having some reservations about the science fiction genre, she signed up for John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars (2001) in the lead role. The film was not well-received, with a 20% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.^[4] In 2004, she briefly appeared as Eve in Species III.

Henstridge turned down the role ultimately played by Linda Fiorentino in Men in Black (1997), and she was the first choice for the role of videogame heroine Jill Valentine in Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004) which she had to pull out of due to conflicts with Species III.

Television[link]

Henstridge has played a number of roles on television, for example in Caracara and The Outer Limits. From 2005 to 2006, she had a recurring role on the ABC drama Commander in Chief, which starred Geena Davis as a fictional female U.S. President. She also hosted Mostly True Stories: Urban Legends Revealed on TLC, a show about urban legends. She guest-starred in the South Park first season episode "Tom's Rhinoplasty" as a substitute teacher, and was credited as "the chick from Species".

Henstridge was working on the TV show She Spies, prior to its cancellation. She has also completed a TV movie for the Lifetime channel titled Widow on the Hill. In 2006, she filmed the CTV original mini-series Would Be Kings in Hamilton, Ontario,^[5] for which she won a Gemini Award.^[6] She also starred in the expansion set to the video game Command and Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, entitled Kane's Wrath.^[7]

In 2008, Henstridge played a role on the ABC show, Eli Stone. She has also been involved with two other productions, joining the cast of Dave Rodriguez's Anytown, an indie drama that examines a racist high school attack and its aftermath. She has also been involved with the production of Should've Been Romeo from American Independent Pictures.

In 2009, Henstridge did a guest spot on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien. During this she demonstrated a Newfoundland custom called "Screeching In" which involved getting O'Brien to drink Newfoundland Screech rum and kiss a large fish.^[8]

In 2011, she appeared on the Season 9 finale and Season 10 premiere of CSI: Miami as Renee Locklear. She then starred in the CW TV series The Secret Circle as Dawn Chamberlain.

Personal life[link]

Henstridge was married to actor Damian Chapa from 1995 to 1996. She has two sons by actor Liam Waite: Tristan River, born October 1998, and Asher Sky, born September 2001.^[9] Henstridge has been in a relationship with Scottish singer-songwriter, stage actor, and author Darius Campbell since 2006.^[10] The two broke off their engagement in early 2010,^[11] but eventually married on Valentine's Day, 2011.^[12]

Filmography[link]

Henstridge at the 2009 Heart Truth fashion show

References[link]

2001 Kevin of the North - released on DVD as Chilly Dogs

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Natasha Henstridge

• Natasha Henstridge at the Internet Movie Database
• Natasha Henstridge at Allmovie
• Natasha Henstridge at Yahoo! Movies