Syfy started production in Vancouver Friday on an update of cult classic "The Philadelphia Experiment" that will star Malcolm McDowell and Nicholas Lea.
The plot of the time-travel thriller is modeled on an urban legend about a military experiment that was allegedly conducted during World War II that would have allowed a U.S. Navy destroyer to cloak itself from enemy tracking devices.
In the movie, this very ship turns up in the present while a team of researchers are trying to replicate the experiment, and chaos ensues.
Lea — best known for playing the double-dealing Alex Krycek on "The X-Files" — plays the sole survivor of the original experiment who must now help thwart the modern-day project. McDowell appears as the scientist who helmed the experiment back in 1943.
A sci-fi film based on the hoax was produced in 1984 and starred Michael Paré — who also has a small part in Syfy's version as a villain.
