Heavy-handed special effects, poor direction, and extensive borrowing of scenes and ideas from Top Gun, Behind Enemy Lines, and  -- most violated here -- 2001: A Space Odyssey combine to make Stealth a silent and deadly bomb. 

The tagline for this movie says, "Fear the sky." Forget that! You should fear plunking down money to watch Stealth instead. This abomination plays out like a video game. Granted, it creates the feeling that the movie might actually be a great ride by sucking viewers into playing along with the characters to figure out the next piece of a convoluted script that plays with one's mind. 

But this expected  "great ride" turns into a roller-coaster suspended in air, and there's no coming down for another two hours. The film starts out with a message much like most video games: characters played by Jessica Biel, Jamie Foxx and Josh Lucas are among a small number of test pilots chosen to fly the most dangerous and potentially deadly of missions carried out by stealth bombers.

These pilots, the chosen ones in a world rife with terrorist plots, aim to put and end to the mayhem. After some foolish dialogue about their bond and the fact that three is a prime number and four is unlucky and would muck up everything,  Commanding Officer CPT. George Cummings (Sam Shepard) tells them a new member has joined their elite squad as a wingman. This latest addition is not a person but rather a drone and unmanned aerial assault vehicle called EDI. 

Lucas’s character, Ben, is more than a little reluctant to give up any space for EDI, but he can't disobey orders from Cummings, so the machine rides along on the next mission.  Everything goes according to plan, and the three human pilots are amazed that their new comrade can fly below the radar and not get caught, thereby accomplishing amazing feats no human could perform. This foreshadows future events and sets up the rest of the plot.

Unfortunately for all concerned, a huge electrical storm strikes and EDI is hit. No one is aware that the drone’s circuitry expands and then contrasts leading to major damage. Despite warnings, Cummings declares the artificial aerial assault vehicle safe to fly on the team’s next mission. He refuses to believe anything bad could happen.

The team gets a horrific shock when EDI, who is so badly compromised, disobeys orders and attacks after being told to abort. Danger and fear escalate when EDI goes one step further and reads secret training documents involving  scenarios about strategic thinking. The machine begins to create its own war mission, one that could lead to nuclear war and Armageddon. 

The story deteriorates even more when we discover the drone ought to be destroyed. It's a hybrid between a jukebox, R2 D2 and HAL-9000 down to the same creepy voice asking will you trust me and why are you doing this, Dave?-type questions. He can download all the world’s greatest music ever invented and play it back. Who knows what other secrets he's incorporated from around the world? After all, he has influences his designer says can be taken "from Captain Kangaroo to Adolf Hitler."

Cummings protects EDI and not his pilots. The story unravels and never shows us exactly why, what or who (besides Orbit, the EDI creator, and Cummings) could be behind EDI -- until the end. We spend too much time wondering why the drone  is protected and less time on chracter development. Cummings is hiding something, and we don't know why. Who is out to gain from all of this and the success of the program with EDI involved?

We meet Keith Orbit (Richard Roxburgh) briefly, and he seems to be more in orbit than his own creation. The reasons behind EDI's malfunction and the connections between Orbit, Cummings and the U.S. Airforce are never clear. Some viewers will wonder for a long time why such a program using stealth jets and artificial intelligence even exists and why an artificially intelligent being is such an issue of importance above and beyond that of human beings

W.D. Ritcher, who hasn't written a script that's been turned into a movie in 10 years nor produced a film in 15years, has taken up a pen again with this effort. Any credibility he earned penning cult horror movies, most notably Invasion of the Body Snatchers, should wane after this painful train wreck. None of the explosions, special effects, directing, writers or actors save Stealth from imploding on impact.

One of the biggest disappointments here is that the characters are not developed. We have no idea what drives any of fighter pilots to do what they do nor what their lives are like outside of the cockpit. How did they beat out 400 people for their missions? What is so special about these three that we should care about their plight for two hours? Missing is a back story that would help us care about them or where the movie is going.

Stealth gives no credit to Jamie Foxx for his caliber of talent. It taints his recent Oscar success. Foxx, who has four new films in production, is slated to appear in a film called Damage Control. Ironically, everyone from Stealth will probably need damage control for participating in an outing that insults the late great Stanley Kubrick, who got it right with Hal-9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey. My advice? Rent and enjoy the latter, but file this one under B for Bomb.

(Released by Columbia Pictures and rated "PG-13" for intense action, some violence, brief strong language and innuendo.)