Every so often, a new science fiction film pops up in Hollywood that is fresh and original and captivates viewers with a mystifying fusion of reality and fantasy.

“Alone in the Dark” is not one of these films — it is neither original nor fresh, and the only mystifying thing about the film is that it was made at all.

Based on the video game of the same title, “Alone in the Dark” stars Christian Slater as paranormal detective Edward Carnby and Tara Reid as scientist Aline Cedrac. That’s right — a scientist.

In a disgustingly confused, desperate plot, estranged lovers Carnby and Cedrac unravel the mystery behind an ancient American Indian civilization that unleashed “something evil” on the world before their race was wiped out 10,000 years ago.

From this “something evil” results a group of zombies and a race of monsters that have been unleashed to wipe out all humanity.

The plot, if that is what one must call it, has more to it than just this, but explaining it — like watching the movie itself — would be a tragic waste of time.

A plot like this might work for a video game, but the translation to the screen is a disaster. The characters are hollow and the violence is simply ridiculous.

There is little to the film’s 96 minutes besides contrite action sequences in which Slater and his brigade rain gunfire as indiscriminately and haphazardly as one spits sunflower seeds.

During intermittent breaks between gunfire, Reid and Slater stand in front of the camera, look at each other and recite lines from the script. Very rarely does acting actually occur.

Director Uwe Boll carefully — and wisely — tries to hide Reid’s nauseating, talentless participation by limiting her dialogue to no more than one sentence per edit. Reid doesn’t so much perform as occasionally take a break from gallivanting with the Hilton sisters to deliver a line with the same emotion as a confused Kip Dynamite.

The only scene in which Reid seems to have some idea of what she is doing is a pathetic dry-humping sequence that would make a ninth-grader scoff, which seems to work for Reid only because she’s not talking.

As Reid and Slater dry hump their way to nothing more than a paycheck, director Boll dry humps as well — he dry humps the motions of what a real director is and what a real science fiction movie should be.

The result is an anti-climactic disaster that is the worst science fiction film in years.