PlatinumRead Just so...so bad

HeadlinesExotic Boring

SeeQuant Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

Skyler Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

jlthornb51 Powerful and insightful observation of small town life and a backward population's unsophisticated reaction to something they can't understand. Director Colin Theys, working from a deeply disturbing script by screen writer John Doolan, takes an alien invasion and turns it on its head as he creatively explores the irrational fear of outsiders inherent in many Middle American settlements. The blood and gore required of any horror film is present in this film and is indeed somewhat shocking at times. The terror is also almost unendurable and the intensity unrelenting. However, this still is one of the most incisive and significant films dealing with small-minded, closed communities and their fear of the unknown. A fine cast gives uniformly superb performances, with Roddy Piper particularly outstanding in the role of a heroic priest who is transformed by his encounter with evil.

rushknight If you're reading this far, it probably means you're hoping to make sense of the title of this review. So let me explain: This movie is fairly low budget, has cheesy clichés everywhere, relatively poor special effects, and generic acting and simplistic dialogue that adheres very strictly to the cookie-cutter character types that populate the script.Don't get me wrong, all of that is what actually what makes this film GOOD.Aside from acting, production value, and good special effects, a good movie is made from two other very vital ingredients: cohesion and honesty.When the director(s) and creators of a movie understand exactly what it is they are trying to convey, and then they creatively use all of the tools in their bag to clearly convey it, the result is a movie with good cohesion. It makes sense, it allows you to follow the story easily, and wraps you into the story.What do I mean by honesty? I mean that some movies try very hard to be more than what they are, and it often comes off as weak and even a little pretentious.Alien Opponent puts forth no pretenses. It knows exactly what it wants to be: a fun hillbilly lovin' action/sci-fi comedy.My only real complaint is that the action sort of dries up towards the end, making things a little slower. They could have used even more characters on the battlefield.I enjoyed this movie.

Voyou Nobodysbusiness Sometimes I just need to relax with an hour and a half of silliness. When I'm lucky, and that's not often at all, I stumble upon a perfect piece, like this Alien Opponent.The plot has an obvious potential for being funny, wacky, entertaining. The film is all of this. Surprisingly, there is even a proper script, complete with imagination and attention to detail. It's silly but not stupid. The main flaw is bad acting, which forced me to reduce my note from a good to an average movie. Too many characters are portrayed by amateurs. On the other hand, some actors enjoyed themselves while being filmed, and this obvious pleasure contaminates the audience. Personally, I did enjoy the whole show and will watch it again.As a side note, I don't enjoy gore at all, so I was glad that Alien Opponent contains very little of it, nothing that bothered me.

yaktheripper I reactivated my account just to give ya'll some balance. This movie is a stinker ladies and gentlemen. We can call it "the little movie that could" but we won't because that would be a betrayal to little movies that actually can..and do. "Alien Opponent" is a mess. It is slow to begin and if you can get past the hobbled set-up it doesn't get much better. The acting is, of course, so sub par that Rowdy Roddy Piper is the best of the bunch...and there is a bunch, and that's not saying anything positive. Of course acting is the product of script and direction; the script is tired and humorless. The actors do little to escape the clutches of the feeble clichés they've been degraded too. Sigh...I saw this B grade actor type circus act before in a "little movie that could" called "Feast". "Feast" does it so much better and makes the genre proud. This wretched excuse of a movie is a disgrace. On a "positive" note...the alien, at times, is nicely designed. It has enough originality that it deserves a better movie and a better script. The special effects also are nicely done and there's enough gore for a gore-hound to get their fix. You deserve better and better you can do...by far.