'SCREAMERS' NOT LIKELY TO LEAVE AUDIENCES SCREAMING FOR MORE.

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Critic

In "Screamers' " sector of space, everyone can hear a scream. Especially when they come from the title devices, which are sort of mobile shredders that reproduce - and redesign - themselves below the surface of a war-torn, future mining planet.

But you won't be hearing much screaming from audiences watching this slack sci-fi thriller. With its clearly limited special effects budget and pokey, trudge-across-the-desert-wastes-one-more-time pacing, this Canadian production delivers precious few shocks of either the visceral or narrative variety.

Based on an old Philip K. Dick story, "Second Variety," this cross-wired cross between "Aliens" and "Terminator 2" has a few intelligent touches, but they're eventually trampled by a series of listless chases, which themselves are punctuated by moments of less-than-epic carnage.

The original "RoboCop," Peter Weller, is Col. Hendricksson, leader of Alliance forces on the backwater world of Sirius 6B. An overly informative opening narration explains how scientists and workers formed the Alliance to combat something called the New Economic Bloc's radiation-releasing mining policies. A planetwide civil war was the result.

But then the undergunned Alliance's Earth allies sent them screamer technology; now, years later, the darn things - which look like little metal dinosaur skeletons with buzz saws - have just about taken over the whole barren place. Meanwhile, the Alliance and NEB rivalry has moved on to other, richer worlds, and the Sirius survivors have pretty much been left for machine meat.

When it becomes evident that the screamers have created new models that look just like humans, Hendricksson sets out to make a survival alliance with his NEB counterpart. But it may already be too late.

The "who can you trust?" paranoid dynamic inherent in this kind of scenario is completely fumbled by director Christian Duguay's tendency to explain too much about how one prevents screamer attacks - then repeatedly introducing new characters who don't take those measures but remain safe anyway. The fact that Hendricksson never seems to pick up on this dead giveaway until it's too late makes him appear, to say the least, unfit for command.

Filmed in a Quebec sand pit, the movie has a cold, arduous quality that extends to its dialogue ("Get your head out of the lilacs, man!"). Some secondary performances, such as Jennifer Rubin's as a black market tough cookie and Andy Lauer's ("Caroline in the City") as a raw recruit have their warmer moments.

But "Screamers" needed to be swifter - not to mention more spectacular or, at least, more inventively staged - if it hoped to generate any real heat and noise.

THE FACTS

The film: "Screamers" (R; violence, language, nudity).

The stars: Peter Weller, Roy Dupuis, Jennifer Rubin, Andy Lauer, Charles Powell.

Behind the scenes: Directed by Christian Duguay. Written by Dan O'Bannon and Miguel Tejada-Flores, based on the short story "Second Variety" by Philip K. Dick. Produced by Tom Berry and Franco Battista. Released by Triumph Films.

Running time: One hour, 47 minutes.

Playing: Citywide.

Our rating: Two Stars.

CAPTION(S):

PHOTO

Photo In an enemy bunker, nothing is as it seems for Ace (Andy Lauer, left) and Ross (Charles Powell) in "Screamers."