Alien Opponent

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.

I know what you're thinking. "Look at this a#%hole. He gave it a ten. Probably a relative of somebody in the crew, or some local who was cast as an extra". And I perfectly understand. IMDb is bursting at the seems with ÜBER-overwhelming reviews from cast, crew, extras and even producers in "disguise". You know the drill - "honest" opinions in all "objectivity" to increase the ratings.

But the answer is no. I have nothing to do with the making of this film...AT ALL! I simply loved this little gem - and gave it a ten for being "the little film that could".

The story is paper thin, the budget ultra low and the actors are light years away from even being in the vicinity of "mediocre". But still - these guys seem to really know what they're doing. The sound - both mix and editing - PRISTINE. Cinematography and film editing - FLAWLESS! The special effects - CGI, robotics and latex - EXCELLENT! To sum it up - the technical side is, surprisingly enough, grade A. How they pulled it off is beyond me.

What IS certain - the team behind this film LOVES making movies. Call me crazy (as you think I am anyway), but it seems that somebody actually cared and took pride in finishing this little project at the highest level possible with the means that were available. There's a "let's use the few dollars we have to make something really cool"-attitude here. You'll see what I mean, if you ever decide to rent this flick (and throw away your hard earned money). It's all in the details.

As for the story (paper thin...remember?), the creators elaborately underline from frame one that this is not to be taken seriously. Under ANY circumstance. This is MEANT to be over the top. Just sit back, enjoy the ride and the "what the f#%k???"-moments, which are plentiful.

This is probably the best 80 minutes I'll never get back. For sure.

From the Chiller network comes Alien Opponent! The movie's loose plot follows a bunch of bumpkins and wackos as they attempt to earn the 100,000 dollar bounty that the junk yard owner is offering for the elimination of the alien who just crash landed in the middle of all the junk.

But if you're watching a movie called Alien Opponent, plot isn't one of your biggest concerns. So step one to having a great time: Turn off your brain! That being said, this movie is good, trashy fun. The blood, at least in the uncut DVD, is plentiful and the body count is through the roof. The movie seems to take an approach toward the value of human life that is, well, non-existent. It has the comedy of a Troma film without going so over the top. The characters are colorful and the pace is fluid.

The only recognizable faces present are Jeremy London (Mallrats) and Roddy Piper. Now, this movie is worth watching just to see Piper in action again as the tough-as-nails priest. Everyone else is relatively new but most perform admirably.

This low-budget gem will never win any awards or show up on your top-ten any time soon but I'll be honest with you: I was never bored, I had no idea what would happen next, and I had fun. When all is said and done, what else do you want?

"Alien Opponent" is listed here on IMDb as Action / Sci-Fi. Why not comedy? Because there surely wasn't an ounce of seriousness to this movie. The absurdity of the storyline and the grotesqueness of the characters just added up to one big bowl of comedy soup.

This movie was actually so cheesy that it was fun to sit through. Don't expect a major impressive storyline, because it just isn't here. This movie is about an alien crash landing on Earth and soon the small community is on end to cash in on a $100.000 price to reclaim the dead body of someone killed by the alien. The junkyard soon becomes a battle-zone where man fights man, but also fights the alien and fights machines.

This movie seemed to be a hilarious spoof on the Sci-Fi genre, and the character's in the movie were so outrageous that it was just hard to take this as a serious movie. And it was actually fun to sit through and watch how the people were taking out one another in various ways and in various methods.

The movie has Jeremy London and Roddy Piper as the top-lining billed names on the posted. Nothing else need be said...

But if you like senseless mayhem, twisted characters, murder and killing with various tools and styles, like campy aliens and questionable dialogue, then "Alien Opponent" is definitely right up your alley.

One thing did strike me odd though, because the title displayed in the actual movie was "Alien Infiltration" and not "Alien Opponent" as here on IMDb.

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.