Shapeshifter is set in a state prison where state law demands the warden has to have a minimum number of female deputies, ex-soldier Ginny Lydon (Jennifer Lee Wiggins) gets the job. It's Ginny's first night & she's placed in the low security wing where they keep the none violent & mentally unbalance prisoners, a new prisoner named Velku (Vaz Andreas) turns out to be a Romanian shapeshifter who can transform into a huge hairy monster thing. It's there to break fellow Romanian Marcoux (Marat Glazer) out & kill any witnesses in order to conceal it's human identity, however it never reckoned on Ginny Lydon who doesn't take too kindly to hairy monsters ripping her prisoners apart on her shift...<br /><br />Co-written & directed by Gregory Lemkin one has to say that without wishing to sound too unkind Shapeshifter is awful. The script by Lemkin & A. Everett Howe is terrible, it's boring, it's predictable, it's slow, nothing of any interest happens & it goes on for too long, far too long. The character's are awful, the dialogue is awful, the comedy relief is awful & all the character motivations are awful like continually splitting up & wondering off down corridors on their own, not making enough of an effort to escape, standing around talking doing nothing in particular & this whole film is just bad. Very bad.<br /><br />Director Lemkin doesn't do anything to make this rubbish any more watchable, there are annoying editing techniques where everything on the screen goes double & blurry, there's the usual irritating & pointless slow motion scenes & as a general rule Shapeshifter is a bit of an eyesore. There's some cheap gore, a few people have their guts ripped out & someone has their head bashed in, these scenes are pretty brief & sound batter than they actually are. There's no atmosphere, no tension & certainly no scares. The special effects are terrible, the actual hairy creature thing looks absolutely awful in every respect. Even with Lemkin trying to keep it in the shadows as much as possible can't disguise how bad this thing looks.<br /><br />With a supposed budget of about $200,000 this was a low budget film & it show's, it's pretty bland, dull & incompetent. Shot in Los Angeles. The acting is terrible by no-one you've ever heard of plain & simple, enough said.<br /><br />Shapeshifter is one of those awful horror films where nothing works, it's one of those films where after the first twenty odd minutes you just sit there waiting & hoping it will finish. Soon. Definitely not recommended.