Shakma

In a medical research complex, a scientist has been testing an experimental compound intended to increase aggression in animals. Most of the trials have failed, but the substance takes hold in a baboon named Shakma, a favourite of one of the young researchers. Before the animal can be put down, it escapes and moves through the building, which that night is locked and occupied by medical students and their friends taking part in a live-action role-playing game. The players, guided by their professor, are shut inside with the animal, and the game turns into a hunt in which they are the prey.

Hugh Parks directed and produced the film, working from a screenplay by Roger Engle. Christopher Atkins plays Sam, the assistant who keeps the baboon alive, with Amanda Wyss as Tracy, Ari Meyers as Kim and Roddy McDowall as Sorenson. It is a low-budget production, made for around two million dollars, and runs just over an hour and a half.

Among viewers the film has landed as a minor entry in the killer-animal horror field: on IMDb it sits at 5 out of 10 across roughly 2,900 votes, while on TMDB it holds 5.5 out of 10 from a much smaller group of 99 ratings. The two audiences are close in their assessment, placing it in middling territory rather than either pole.