Earthling

Earthling starts out as an intriguing film. We're left to begin piecing together the disjointed bits of storytelling to begin this fantastic sci-fi journey. After about an hour we're still being teased with disjointed information and characters who know what they're doing but unfortunately forgot to tell us the viewer what they're doing. They act with meaning and motivation but there is no clear reason why they are acting and talking the way they are. It's all very well to be mysterious and aloof but frankly i got lost and ending up not caring what they were doing. It's like the director watched too many David Lynch films and tried to outdo him. In the end i got it but i really didn't care. It went from strong, to confusing to will this please end. The only saving grace was the lead actor, she was brilliant but even towards the end you could just see her delivering lines and probably wondering what the hell was going on too. It's nice to evoke feelings and emotions in film but at the end of the day it's about entertainment. It wasn't there.

Interesting premise. A mysterious object appears from space. As it approaches earth it causes a disturbance. The result is some people have strange dreams. However, this is not a 50's type of sci-fi. It is more of a psychological thriller where high school teacher Judith (Rebecca Spence) and a few others must find out who they really are on the inside. As we watch this movie, we travel the same path and may find out who we really are.

Looking at one-line reviews of this movie you will come away with totally different visions of what you are about to watch. The movie gives too many dimensions and allows the viewer to fixate on just one or two of them. What may appear to be slow to one viewer is methodical to another. What may look unduly artsy to one viewer is the only way to portray the story in the time and media given.

The actual execution of this movie includes drugs and weird relationships. I cannot help but think that they are trying to disseminate more than just the story. If they are I, then missed it and do not have time to pick it up.

This movie is a disjointed mishmash of things that don't make sense: a meaningless opening, constant, meaningless flashbacks and cuts so big you could sail the Queen Mary through them. Depressing background music. Pointless scenes with no rhyme or reason. Fundamental ideas that we've all seen before - obsessive drawing of pictures from Close Encounters, and symbiotes from Stargate, for example.

The holes in the dialog were so big that at one point I had to rewind to watch the run-up to one scene three times to make sure I hadn't missed something. It turns out I hadn't missed anything - it was either another gaping hole in the dialog or the editor went mad and took a meat axe to it.

If the plot got any vaguer this flick wouldn't have one. It's a low-budget, miserable failure. Save yourself the cost of the video hire. Watching paint dry is more entertaining.

Oh, and don't let the mention of Close Encounters or Stargate mislead you into believing this is actually a sci-fi flick. It isn't. It's more of a weird drama that tries to ask "what makes us human?"

Some interesting moments early on, but it goes WAY too slow from halfway to the end, plus gets really confused and left me scratching my head. Still not sure what happened and I don't want to watch it again.

While this may not appeal to the general public, it is what science fiction can be. Instead of a bunch of intergalactic cowboys facing off with one another, this is a truly thought provoking movie. There are shades of David Lynch in this stark presentation. Several people are suddenly faced with a kind of mass amnesia after an event they can't entirely explain. Because they are humans, they see what as happening to them initially as a type of disease (even epilepsy in one case). Soon they are draw to each other. Part of their problem is that they are such diverse personalities who are filled with distrust. They are drawn to water, particular just off the shore of a small lake where a series of images invade their psyches. They all have growths on their heads, like the beginnings of little deer antlers. They are also losing some of their skin. Things unfold in a really interesting way with tragic consequences, but there is an answer somewhere and it requires a great deal of trust. While this is a highly imperfect film, I appreciated that their reach exceeds their grasp.