This cliche with sprockets is about a ragtag cargo-ship crew that finds an abandoned Russian research ship whose computer system has been taken over by a shapeless life form intent on killing humans, which it perceives as destructive viruses. It's essentially an amalgam of well-worn plot elements regularly seen on "Star Trek," "The X-Files" and in "Alien" and "Terminator" movies.

The all-too-familiar something's-out-there plot aside, any movie, regardless of genre, would be a loser with characters as one- dimensional and unengaging as the crew in "Virus."