A few astronauts discover a giant bat aboard an abandoned spaceship. They also find two men and a woman. They are brought back to life where they wake up and reveal their unsuspected powers.

These vampire-like creatures steal human souls in the hope to catalyze their energy to their planet.

This Tobe Hooper film can be summarized much quicker than his other realizations. He plays in the grey zone between horror and science fiction that is appreciated by few. The concept of interplanetary vampires is interesting but I dislike the approach used in this movie. We should have forgotten the space ship aspect after the introduction and not centre the action on a scientific laboratory. These two environments give the film a cold appearance.

The special effects are extraordinary, not only for when this movie was made. The puppets of the cadavers in decomposition surely earn their praises. They resemble the thin un-dead creature attached to a table in Return of the Living Dead. The effect used to illustrate the ascension of the stolen souls is overused but very impressive.

The biggest problem this film has is the repetition of the good elements, the inappropriate proportion of sci-fi and horror and the incredible speed at which Earth crumbles. The good actors help us swallow these negative characteristics but they don’t succeed in making it a good movie.