Andrew breaks down SOME of the best and worst movies that feature alien abduction. Are you scared?
Ever since H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds solidified itself into pop cultural
consciousness, science fiction enthusiasts have been fascinated with the notion
of extraterrestrial life existing in the far reaches of the Universe. Could intelligent life be scouring the galaxy
for other worlds and dimensions? Could
they visit us? And if so, what would
happen if we met one of them? The common
fear and theory is that the hairless grey aliens would promptly suck us up
inside their ornate spacecraft to subject us to a litany of bizarre medical
experiments, projecting our own fears of torture at the hands of man onto an
entity beyond our realm of understanding.
With this list, let us kick off this focus on six textbook examples of
the science fiction subgenre that try to stress time and time again that we are
not alone in this vast interstellar cosmos.
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| "You wanna see something really scary?!!!" |
Close
Encounters of the Third Kind (1977 – written and directed by Steven Spielberg)
Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind is without a doubt the
quintessential alien abduction and UFO film.
A massive blockbuster years ahead of its time, Close Encounters remains the most artistically, commercially and
critically successful UFO film ever made.
Much like Kubrick’s 2001: A Space
Odyssey, the film is an experience full of awe and wonder as it reaches for
the Heavens and onward. Spielberg’s
second hit and collaboration with actor Richard Dreyfuss concerns Roy Neary, a
family man with a blue collar job whose brief encounter with a UFO forever
turns his life upside down and alters his course for the stars. Roy Neary’s breakdown from stable husband and
father to self-destructive UFO obsessive represents the most realistic attempt
at the incomprehensible impact of an alien encounter has on human beings. Full of astonishing vistas courtesy of visual
effects wizard Douglas Trumbull (2001;
Blade Runner) and a gifted performance by Dreyfuss, Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a timeless masterpiece which
the United States Library of Congress deemed essential to the National Film
Registry. In other words, “This means
something! This is important!”.
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| "Your face looks funny. Like, haha freaky funny." |
Fire
in the Sky (1993 – directed by Robert Lieberman)
Undoubtedly the scariest alien abduction film ever
made, Fire in the Sky loosely recounts
the true story of abductee Travis Walton (D.B. Sweeney) and his 5 co-loggers
who witnessed his abduction. On November
5, 1975, in Northeastern Arizona, Travis and crew are returning home from a
long day of felling trees on a government contract when they happen upon a
strange object hovering deep within the woods.
Curious about the sight, Travis exits the truck to take a closer look
and is blasted by an unearthly beam of light emanating from the object, which
hurls him several feet into the air and knocks him out cold. Fearing he was killed, the observing crew
fees the scene only to return later to find both Travis and the object
missing. Suspected of a murder cover-up,
the film is largely about the hardships endured by the crew from the local townsfolk
believing Travis’ disappearance to be the result of foul play. However, all those theories are squelched
five days later when Travis mysteriously reappears naked, bruised and
afraid. It is here we, the audience, are
allowed in flashback a glimpse at the horrors Travis experienced inside the
alien spacecraft. Although the story was
changed drastically for dramatic effect from Travis’ original story, to call
these flashbacks utterly horrifying would be too modest a description. They’re the stuff of unmitigated nightmares,
evoking the same claustrophobic terror as the medical examination scenes in The Exorcist. This is one of the few films I saw as a child
where I actually wanted to get up and leave the theater. Though Fire
in the Sky is something of a misguided film that isn’t entirely sure how it
wants to assess the situation, as a piece of science fiction horror, it hits
hard and will leave all who encounter it in a state of shock.
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| "We are the Lollipop Guild. Give us your children." |
Communion
(1989 – directed by Philippe Mora)
Another allegedly true story of alien abduction
(based on the autobiographical account by Whitley Strieber), only this one
stars Christopher Walken in the titular role!
Communion concerns the author
in question and his family as they reside on vacation within their distant
cabin in the wilderness. Night after
night, the family is visited upon by extraterrestrial beings and Whitley is
abducted. The family’s life is thrown in
disarray as wife, son and relatives try to make sense of their father’s bizarre
behavior and paranoia. Undergoing
hypnosis, Whitley recalls a strange collective of black-eyed grey aliens and
even stranger dwarf like creatures. What
makes Communion linger with viewers
is how completely strange the whole thing is.
As Whitley and hypnotherapist attempt to purvey the blocked memories, we
see some truly bizarre recollections which are either real, imagined, or simply
altered by the extraterrestrials working to cover up their ruse. Scenes of Whitley receiving an anal probe
will no doubt stick in viewers’ minds and perhaps even elicit unintentional
laughter, but other scenes of Whitley talking to his alien doppleganger and a
grey who removes a face mask to reveal an elephant-like trunk for a snout are
too out there for words. Sporting a
score by Eric Clapton (an unusual choice for film composition) and an unhinged
Walken (much to the real Strieber’s dismay) Communion
truly is one of the weirdest films you’ll ever see!
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| "I'm not guessing who it is and I'm not turning around to see who it is. Okay? I'm just really freaked out." |
Dark
Skies (2013 – written and directed by Scott Stewart)
Touted by adverts as being from the same producers
as Paranormal Activity and Insidious, Dark Skies is unfortunately among the more run-of-the-mill titles
in the alien abduction subgenre. The
film concerns a dysfunctional family and two young boys, Jesse and Sammy, who
share horror stories about the “Sandman” to distract themselves from their
parents’ feuding. Out of nowhere, food
is strewn across the kitchen floor, which Sammy promptly blames on the
Sandman. As the disturbances grow more
intense, the family begins to experience lost time and the mother spots a dark
figure looming over Sammy’s bed one night, prompting the installation of
security cameras. Soon marks begin to
appear on the sons’ bodies and the figures start showing up on the security
cameras. More or less a cheap knockoff
of Signs with the framework of Insidious, Dark Skies bears that unwanted distinction of being thrown
together. While the aliens themselves
manage to creep out hardened science fiction fans with their silent movements
through the household and lanky figure, there really isn’t any effort to try
and do something new here. We’ve seen it
all before in infinitely better thrillers, including the flawed but somewhat
effective Insidious. The stock characterizations, family dynamics
and clairvoyant children can’t help but tread the same ground fans of the genre
have walked time and time again.
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| "Taco Bell......noooooo!!!!"""" |
The
Fourth Kind (2009 – written and directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi)
The
Fourth Kind is not merely a bad science fiction
thriller, it’s one of the absolute worst films ever released to mainstream
movie theaters. Purporting to be based
on real events which occurred in Nome, Alaska in the year 2000, The Fourth Kind is that rare beast of
awfulness that manages to self-terminate within the opening scenes. Seen in both the trailer and film itself,
Milla Jovovich approaches the camera, announces herself as an actress and that
she’ll be playing the fictional Dr. Abigail Tyler. With tons of random dates and locations
thrown onscreen, the director, Olatunde Osunsanmi, proceeds to insert himself
into the picture by interviewing the “real” Dr. Abigail Tyler. As every character appears onscreen,
subtitles appear indicating both the actor we’re seeing and the character
they’re playing. If that’s not enough to
take you right out of whatever narrative this film is trying to accomplish, the
director includes split-screen shots juxtaposing both the “real” footage of
Abigail Tyler beside the re-enacted footage of Jovavich’s Abigail Tyler. What’s the purpose? Which heads at Universal Studios took a look
at this approach and deemed it passable for theatrical distribution?
Soon the split screens start moving around without
reason, actors’ dialogue in the re-enacted scenes sync up with the “real”
footage, scenes are played twice both ways, and whatever money shots people
paid to see are obscured by the reliable low-budget tactic of tape distortion
so we can’t see what’s happening. And
then there’s the exploitative misuse of real life tragedies associated with
Nome, Alaska to try and sell the idea to gullible moviegoers that the region is
dogged with alien abductions. If
Olatunde Osunsanmi’s intention was to make THE Dada-Art movie to end them all,
he brilliantly succeeded. As it stands, The Fourth Kind is an intolerable
creation whose only conceivable reason for garnering a Blu-ray release is to
educate people on how not to make a film.
Alien
Abduction (2014 – directed by Matty Beckerman)
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| "Aliens told me I can't play Minecraft anymore." |
-Andrew Kotwicki