May 2012
2 posts
1 tag
District 9: #NoNeedToBelieve
The number one question I always get when I tell people I write this blog is, ‘What’s your favorite alien movie?’ No question, it’s got to be District 9. The only movie that grabbed my attention and so beautifully told a great story in the first 10 minutes was Pixar’s ‘Up’. From there the story never lets go and is a constant adventure through a set of circumstances that everyone can identify...
1 tag
Battleship: #DecentContact
I haven’t loved a movie this much since Battle LA. I dragged a few friends with me who weren’t huge alien movie fans and they were pleasantly surprised how entertaining it was, more than Cowboys and Aliens at least. The effects were latest standards, especially the sounds, and the technology the aliens used was pretty creative. The plot line was easy to follow without too many holes and I thought...
January 2012
3 posts
1 tag
Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind: #DecentContact
Although being an older movie from the 70s, I still had high expectations for Close Encounters of the 3rd kind has it’s considered such a classic in the genre. I could appreciate that there were some original themes and ideas that have been copied over the last 3 decades, but I left the movie feeling just MEH.
So many open questions for me after the movie…so the aliens chose this guy and...
1 tag
Contact: #NoNeedToBelieve
Simply one of my top three favorite movies ever made. You can love this movie on so many levels, and being an alien movie fan is certainly one of them, but this is one of the few movies I’ve reviewed that anyone can enjoy. Old, young, conservative, liberal, male, female, I just can’t see a demographic that wouldn’t like this movie. There are so many great aspects, from the acting, the writing,...
1 tag
Star Trek - First Contact: #TakeMeToYourDealer
I’m not a huge trekkie by any means, but I did enjoy this movie. The dialog around why contact matters, how this can affect the world and the event itself is very well done. Not a fan of the bumbling borg people, but don’t let this distract you from the uplifting message that we can be a better civilization if things like food, shelter and clean water are provided to all. Meaning becomes an...
November 2011
2 posts
1 tag
Super 8: #DecentContact
2011 was a fantastic year for alien movie fans with several high profile movies coming out including Battle: LA in March and then two alien movies in the middle of the height of the summer movie season within six weeks of each other, one being in 1800s Wild West and the other in 1979 Ohio.
Since this was produced by Spielberg and directed by JJ Abrams, I had fairly big expectations for Super 8....
1 tag
Alien Nation: #TakeMeToYourDealer
I’m not one for old movies, which I define as anything before 1995, and a sci-movie from the 80s that’s watchable is incredibly hard to come by. So, that said, I went into this movie with extremely low expectations.
Overall, Alien Nation is simply a cop movie with aliens added in, but without much creativity added around the aliens. The fact that they aliens look almost identical to us except for...
October 2011
1 post
1 tag
Cloverfield: #DecentContact
The movie opens from the view point of one of main characters filming interviews of attendees at his friend’s going-away party, purposely erratic, low angles and kind of crappy quality. That said, it worked well for the intro as you get a good sense of the story and build a connection, but I wish they had ditched the jumpy handheld direction later in the movie. The dark, running away from...
September 2011
3 posts
1 tag
Attack the Block: #TakeMeToYourDealer
Being a huge arsenal fan, I have a soft spot for any media from Britain. Techno music, crappy TV and the fun movies about a group of British kids. So, that being said I went into this low-budget movie with decent expectations.
The alien aspect was a bit off for me with very little offered in terms of why they were there and where they came from. I would almost call this more of a monsters...
1 tag
Alien: #NoNeedToBelieve
Considering this movie was made in 1979, and I didn’t see it until 2011, there are some pretty big draw backs. “Old movies” are laden with long silent patches, strange audio that makes it hard to understand the dialog and generally over the top “baaad doop ooop” sound effects. Compare the audio work in Alien vs “Cowboys and Aliens” for example.
Despite...
1 tag
Paul: #WeComeInBoredom
This movie is marketed as an alien comedy, an ambitious idea with the only others in the category being Coneheads and possibly Space Balls. I don’t include Mars Attacks or Men In Black, as those have so much more to offer than comedy like action, creativity and overall quality. I get it, we haven’t had a comedy about alien(s) is quite awhile and the 80s and early 90s were littered with...
July 2011
1 post
1 tag
Cowboys & Motherfucking Aliens: #DecentContact
What’s to say about an alien movie that blends Cowboys and Aliens, and I don’t just mean the title. What do you expect? Shoot em ups, old corale style? Check. Surprising amazing sounds effects? Check. But what about the simple amazing ability of Hollywood’s top people to recruit amazing talent like Daniel Craig and (out of retirement) Harrison Ford? Check.
I’m not going...
June 2011
1 post
1 tag
Battle Los Angeles: #DecentContact
You have to hand it to Sony for making the movie Battle: LA. With a fairly large budget (estimated at $100MM) they have already grossed over $200MM and it hasn’t even been released on blue-ray yet. Between a great marketing campaign involving the cool re-entry circles seen above that have become almost iconic, and big names like Aaron Eckhart (so hot right now) and Michelle Rodriguez, who...
May 2011
1 post
1 tag
Skyline: #TakeMeToYourDealer
Skyline was the first alien movie i’ve seen in years that was so horrible that i enjoyed it. The acticting was sub-par (that guy from Dexter got a movie role?!) and the directing wasn’t great either but take it for what it is: two high end special graphics engineers convinced a studio to give them $10,000,000 to create an effects based movie. The fact that the main character...