'Chimera' is an extremely short-running (4 episode) horror drama from the early 1990's.
The ideas are so sinister and horrific that they might have been penned by Nigel Kneale.
Set in Yorkshire, in the north of England, a supposed fertility clinic is being used as a front for inter-species experiments, using eggs and sperm from unwitting patients. The result is a chimp-human hybrid that escapes during the first episode and runs amok with a large knife in the 'clinic', eviscerating everyone it finds. So, we begin with a frightful crime, and the rest of the series entails a sinister who-done-it as to the nature and capture of the culprit.
The viewer doesn't know the killer's identity, there is only a clue from a screaming, violent spectre that may or may not be human, and may or may not be sane, being bundled out of a van and into the facility.
This is the kind of programme at which British television could often excel. The ideas are so vile that they grip your attention as they unfold. It's science-fiction (or it was then) it's a slasher-horror work with hints of Frankenstien, it's a who-done-it, and it's a conspiracy theory.
Sadly, the programme inevitably suffers from under-funding and limited production values that have always dogged British television. Lighting, camera-work and script could all have been a lot better. Even so; the 4-hours allotted to it's presentation is just about equal to the plot threads and discovery whilst still making for a worthy watch. The beast itself is rather campy in its final denouement and might have benefited from some of today's CGI, or better still - a little of Rob Bottin's animatronic magic.
Worth a watch if you can find a copy of the mini-series. An abridged movie of the same material called 'Monkeyboy' is little more than a trailer. It has all of the - now - inadequate highlights and omits most of the slowly-developing tension. Avoit the latter.
The ideas are so sinister and horrific that they might have been penned by Nigel Kneale.
Set in Yorkshire, in the north of England, a supposed fertility clinic is being used as a front for inter-species experiments, using eggs and sperm from unwitting patients. The result is a chimp-human hybrid that escapes during the first episode and runs amok with a large knife in the 'clinic', eviscerating everyone it finds. So, we begin with a frightful crime, and the rest of the series entails a sinister who-done-it as to the nature and capture of the culprit.
The viewer doesn't know the killer's identity, there is only a clue from a screaming, violent spectre that may or may not be human, and may or may not be sane, being bundled out of a van and into the facility.
This is the kind of programme at which British television could often excel. The ideas are so vile that they grip your attention as they unfold. It's science-fiction (or it was then) it's a slasher-horror work with hints of Frankenstien, it's a who-done-it, and it's a conspiracy theory.
Sadly, the programme inevitably suffers from under-funding and limited production values that have always dogged British television. Lighting, camera-work and script could all have been a lot better. Even so; the 4-hours allotted to it's presentation is just about equal to the plot threads and discovery whilst still making for a worthy watch. The beast itself is rather campy in its final denouement and might have benefited from some of today's CGI, or better still - a little of Rob Bottin's animatronic magic.
Worth a watch if you can find a copy of the mini-series. An abridged movie of the same material called 'Monkeyboy' is little more than a trailer. It has all of the - now - inadequate highlights and omits most of the slowly-developing tension. Avoit the latter.