The Science Fiction Horror and Fantasy Film Review
UFOs are Unidentified Flying Objects and are a real world phenomenon. Originally referred to as Flying Saucers, the phenomenon was first reported in 1947 and was an attempt to deal with reports of unexplained saucer-like objects observed in the sky. This quickly led to a rash of sightings and the speculation of alien visitors as the cause. The flying saucer phenomenon bled through into 1950s Alien Invasion cinema and flying saucers were a common means whereby aliens arrived.
The UFO phenomenon began to take on other aspects. The real-life based tv movie The UFO Incident (1975) popularised the phenomenon of Alien Abduction and this entered the mythology, as did blanked memory and hypnotic regression to recall abduction experiences. Around the same time, there was also the tying of UFOs to Ancient Astronauts and the fringe science claims that many ancient texts and inscriptions depicted alien visitors and UFOs.
Steven Spielberg made the enormously optimistic UFO and alien contact film Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and this popularised UFO experiences. After this, UFOs went from metal saucers to glowing lights in the sky. Other aspects soon began to appear from Grey aliens, alien implants, claims of alien impregnation and the fascination with anal probings following Whitley Strieber’s claims of abduction in his book Communion (1987).
Another key element of UFO mythology is the belief that a UFO had crashed at Roswell, New Mexico in 1947 and that it or aliens from it are being held by the US government at Area 51 – a number of works purport to depict what happened or visit Area 51. There is also belief in the Men in Black, sinister government agents that cover up evidence in the aftermath of an incident. Much of this extends well into the area of Conspiracy Theories.
These conspiracy theories were wound into tv’s hugely popular The X Files (1993-2002, 2016-8), which explored many aspects of UFO mythology during its run, and in turn greatly influenced other works. There have also been a number of films depicting supposed true-life abduction experiences. Also popular in recent years have been Found Footage UFO encounter films.
Low-budget UFO/alien abduction film that mostly this just retreads familiar material, although it does evince a certain interesting state of rubber reality about what is happening
High-concept Jon Favreau directed film that has a winning title concept, overflows with star power and is made on a big budget. But the script feels like it had no idea what to do after setting up its title conceptual mash-up
Ron Howard film clearly inspired by the success of E.T.. This story about seniors being rejuvenated after swimming in a pool that has an alien pod in it received critical kudos during its day but the film operates as a simplistic and naive wish-fulfillment fantasy
Another adaptation of Journey to the West. Coming from Jeffrey Lau, a director who specialises in rowdy, slapstick films, this is the most nutso adaptation of the story ever, winding in everything from alien visitors and Transformers
From the era of Disney live-action comedies, this involves assorted slapstick tomfoolery as various parties try to aid or capture a telepathic alien cat that is stranded on Earth
Norwegian comedy where two friends who were a champion laser tag duo in their teens are now in adult life where they are forced to pair back up to fight off alien invaders
From The Blair Witch Project co-director Daniel Myrick, a film about two paramedics abducted into a crazed UFO cult who believe their delivery is coming
Disney live-action film with two psi-powered kids on the run. A popular hit that seems to have been mostly construed around a series of novelty effects set-pieces
Early 1960s Italian space opera from Antonio Margheriti about a rogue planet on a course towards Earth. Not nearly as interesting as it suggests it is going to be.
The success of Star Wars saw a host of copies made over the next few years. This was one of several low-budget Italian space opera knockoffs of this period, featuring invading aliens from Ganymede
This was The Asylum’s mockbuster take on Battle Los Angeles, a rehash of alien invasion cliches but with modestly more vigour than most of their efforts
A low-budget cute alien film made in the aftermath of post-E.T., this purports to be based on the true story of a UFO and alien visitor who landed in 19th Century Texas
The first time we have had a remake of a bad movie – in this case the 1958 film. The title role is cast with Darryl Hannah and the shabby effects gets a much more polished work over
The Asylum’s mockbuster version of Godzilla vs Kong that features a giant-sized chimpanzee and gila monster facing off against one another
From the director of the Terrifier films, a horror anthology in which a babysitter and kids sit down to watch a mysterious videotape on Halloween night. The first screen appearance of Art the Clown
An alien invasion film with a more character driven focus than most, telling the story through the eyes of a husband and wife separated across different states as he tries to get back home
From prolific producer Scott Jeffrey, best known for Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, a low-budget Alien copy, essentially an Alien that takes place in an English country mansion
Film about a mysterious alien artifact unearthed in the Antarctic that falls apart due to a script that is constantly jumping all over the place and spending more time homaging other science-fiction films
Found Footage film about various people in the woods in the aftermath of a UFO crash. Essentially The Blair Witch Project with UFOs instead of a backwoods haunting
Family-friendly superhero film that places more focus on slapstick than superheroics and contains an embarrassing return to the screen for Chevy Chase
This, the second film from Nacho Vigalondo, is a head-scratcher, Though it is ostensibly an alien invasion film, Vigalondo instead creates a comedy of errors
Albert Pyun makes an alien body snatchers film that has been shot Found Footage style and takes place entirely from the viewpoint of the dashcam camera of a police car
An enigmatic film from director Rolf de Heer where a town in the Australian Outback is haunted by strange lights and other mysterious unexplained phenomena
In the aftermath of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, this was made by a company specialising in sensationalistic tabloid documentaries. Spielberg’s light show is dropped in favour of conspiratorial government coverup view of UFOs
The fourth of the Indiana Jones films, returning after a 19 year gap to general disappointment. Largely a film about Indy getting old, this tries but the action scenes pale against what the series was in its heyday
The Green Hornet was a tv series based on the radio and serial masked hero. Following Bruce Lee’s ascent to superstardom, three episodes of the series were re-edited as a feature film
An entry in a popular series of French slapstick comedies with Louis de Funes as a comic gendarme. In this, the series sole genre entry, he goes up against alien visitors
The film that made Roland Emmerich’s name as a specialist in mass destruction spectacle. At heart, this rehashes a 1950s alien invasion film on a big-budget and adds blatantly sentimentalised American flag-waving
This makes a fictitious claim to be a dramatisation of alien abductions that took place in Alaska. This creates something that is undeniably interesting before shooting itself in the foot by heading into Ancient Astronauts territory
Tobe Hooper’s remake of the 1950s alien invaders classic for Cannon Films has much better effects and more technical proficient than the original but misses any of its paranoid, alienated mood
The very first film ever made about UFOs. This is fascinating as a work about UFOs made before all the other claptrap about abductions, impregnations etc came in. The film itself is rather dull
Group of twentysomethings go to a cabin in the woods, are abducted and attacked by E.T.s. I wanted to like this but there is something generic and interchangeable about everything that is happening
Alien invasion film set around the so-called Roswell Incident. Faux science-fiction written by cliche the entire way
Ridiculous action film produced at the peak of The X Files popularity about two detectives against a body-hopping alien and sinister government agency
1950s British science-fiction entry that draws influence from the Quatermass films. While the title(s) leads you to expect an alien invasion entry, it is in actuality more of a British copy of a giant insect film. A routine effort that is eventually done in by utterly impoverished giant insect effects
An Asylum mockbuster aimed to exploit the release of the Transformers spinoff BumbleBee. This has the unique distinction of being a Transformers-type film shot as Found Footage
Head-scratching animated oddity from Disney that adapts the talking animal fairytale only to throw in a series of bizarre plot elements that end up as an alien invasion story
A blatant copy of M. Night Shyamalan’s Signs even down to the near-identical title and a similar plot about crop circles appearing on a farm presaging an alien invasion
Directed by low-budget actress Marlene Mc’Cohen, this is both an alien invasion and a zombie apocalypse film. A film where the skill gap and budget falls well short of what is needed to make a film work
Sequel that turns a witty original into overblown slapstick that never consists of anything more than absurd gags with aliens and technology popping up from behind everyday objects
A film spun out around a YouTube channel of videogame reviews. This sinks down into unfunny fannish in-joking, while the attempts to be a mock bad movie only seem silliness for its own sake
1950s bad movie classic with Allison Hayes as a wife made into a giant by a passing UFO who rampages through town after her philandering husband. Painfully bad effects make for show that frequently slides into the laughable
Head-scratchingly strange Italian film that seems made as a crosshatch of 1970s Devil Child films and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Makes no sense in terms of story but worth watching for the bizarreness of its imagery
Unsold tv pilot that was clearly made as a quick cash-in on Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Produced by Quinn Martin, responsible for many classic 70s tv shows, who has simply rehashed his The Invaders
Another film from Charles Band’s Full Moon Productions, this is made with a deliberate chessiness as aliens take over a radio station shrinking girls down into bottles
Interest in UFO phenomena peaked in the 1970s with numerous books seriously studying it and twice as many crackpot ones. While there had been various flying saucers in 1950s alien invasion cinema, this obscure and rather dull oddity was the first fictional film investigating the phenomena
The first Japanese entry in the great alien invader fad of the 1950s. Nothing great but it does boast the awesomeness of starfish-shaped aliens
The big screen remake of the 1960s sitcom about a wacky alien visitor. However, this all of the original’s amusements promptly gets buried under frenetic slapstick and cheap CGI gags
Action film with Michael Madsen and a mystery alien woman fighting a government coverup of UFOs to retrieve his abducted daughter
Another failed attempt to film the works of Kurt Vonnegut where Vonnegut’s ironic pessimism ends up as witless slapstick chaos on screen
In this rather shabby effort, Santo (in the sixteenth of his 52 films) takes on invaders from Mars whose entire plan seems to hang on the need to have to defeat Santo in the wrestling ring
Cheaply made and frequently unintentionally hilarious variant on UFO conspiracies that wheels out all the usual cliches – alien implants, the Men in Black, recovered memories etc
Skyline was a modest alien invasion film; this is a long-planned sequel. The new director has simply turned it into an action film and tediously deals with every alien encounter with gunfire, stunts and explosions
The Bare Wench Project was an inane softcore parody of The Blair Witch Project. This is the first of four sequels in which another troupe of girls go wandering in the woods while finding almost any opportunity to take their clothes off
A TV movie that was released theatrically outside the US with Dale Robinette as a James Bond copycat with Dale Robinette up against villain Patrick MacNee who has weaponised the ozone layer
A pitifully cheap copy of Gremlins about alien creatures locked in a soundstage and now accidentally unleashed. One of the worst films ever made.
Ken Russell’s worst film, a ridiculously bad biopic of the psychic Uri Geller
Another in the interminable softcore Blair Witch parodies with a group of minimally talented and clothed bimbos wandering around the woods and failing to take proceedings seriously
Another excruciatingly bad mock exploitation film from Tony Watt, who may well be the world’s worst filmmaker. This mixes killer women, aliens, UFOs, Mafia into an incomprehensible mix
A dreadful sequel to the Ron Howard hit Cocoon about seniors encountering aliens. This misses all the interesting potential of a sequel and drowns in schmaltz and unfunny comedy routines
Possibly THE worst film ever made. Tony Watt throws an mash-up of exploitation elements together in an incomprehensible plot. A film that made me want to hammer a nail through my eyeball rather than keep watching
I hate the Ice Age films and their tediously extruded adventures. The opening sequence here and its ignorance of even basic science is the most inane thing in the entire series
Larry Buchanan must count as one of the all-time bad movie directors and in this ultra-cheap alien invader film, in itself a remake of Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957), he is true to form
An inanely awful film based on the Sheb Wooley song. This is a really lame copy of E.T. in which a young Neil Patrick Harris forms a band with the title alien
A completely ridiculous film that throws in an incomprehensible mix of an amok A.I.’s that takes over a stealth plane, UFOs, mind control and military conspiracy and proves badly made on every single count
Italian film about a superhero that gains animal powers by putting on a belt. A strong contender for the worst superhero film ever made
An excruciatingly unfunny spoof of Men in Black that was shoved out using the name of National Lampoon magazine. A painful viewing experience.