Die UFO-Verschwörung

This was a very decent film and definitely worth watching - the acting was underplayed and there were no stupid special effects - just a good interesting plot and story.

I have no idea if the math was accurate but it seemed quite plausible and the mystery kept me waiting until the end - I almost felt like a math genius just watching it unfold.

The acting and direction was good - the usual aspergers/autistic type math genius that gets to prove his point by solving a really hard problem - made me think that the future of human kind will probably be in the hands of someone like this.

Not the average action packed sci-fi alien squealing fest but very entertaining.

Yeah, it's been done before in Close Encounters, sort of, but it's quite a different take. There is a Eureka!! bonding moment between the professor and student about the wavelength of radio signals emitted by hydrogen and it's kind of touching.

It's nice see college students that really seem like college students. Andersen does a very convincing job of a college professor.

One major annoyance is the very last line, when the student is asked what all this means, and he answers "we are not alone." Well, DUH, by this point of the movie. Bad choice there.

This movie ultimately looks and feels like a pretty good student film, it has a pretty interesting story at it's core, and is made on a low budget, it also has some fine acting in it, but at the end of the day, it delivers little i would call cinema worthy. Now i didn't see it in a cinema, but still, a movie is a movie.

This film kind of feels like an episode of a TV show, in it's editing and it's camera work. It's a movie that is made almost entirely on autopilot it seems, it delivers a formula you have seen hundreds of times before, it delivers very few surprises outside the plot itself which could go anywhere to be honest.

And that is what saves this film, that i didn't know exactly where the main story would take me, and this raised the suspense, so i was never bored watching this, at least not much. But Gillian Anderson and David Strathairn has way too little to work with here, it almost feels like they are in this to either cash in on some easy job, or to maybe support an up and coming director, because they are both fine actors, and in this film, you couldn't tell if you had never seen them before.

It's a decent end of the day film, it keeps your attention for the most part, but it wants to be something more, but there just isn't enough money involved to take it to the next level, so it tries to just stay on the ground, tries to keep things small, though ultimately the story itself is HUGE, so it sort of clashes a bit.

So a decent afternoon flick you can watch while having some food or just feeling bored. Not a bad movie, but nothing special either.

6/10 - Fair

6.2 star average in IMDb is it bit more on the money than the ridiculous 2.8 on Letterboxd, but viewers have really missed the boat on the definition of an overlooked gem. Despite its pedestrian title, UFO is an excellent science fiction drama which somehow manages to make mathematics suspenseful by virtue of inspired casting, a tight, literate script, taught direction, and very good, sincere acting on everyone's part. The score is low key, but effectively adds an additional level of tension.

While not conceived on the grand scale of high-budget concept-driven productions such as Arrival, Annihilation, Interstellar, Ex Machina, and Predestination, UFO nonetheless joins the ranks of these films as part of the cycle of intelligent science fiction we've been enjoying in recent years.

This was certainly no big budget Hollywood blockbuster, but a fairly decent and interesting film that held my attention.

It didn't have any action or thrills, but the rather original concept behind a UFO sighting was enough to keep me well interested.

This is novice director and writer Ryan Eslinger's fourth film installment, and he did a very good job.

The score was a little too obvious throughout the entire film, and pausing it in certain scenes would have created better tension for the viewer. The pacing and length were just right. The C & B grade cast performed fairly well, but I feel Alex Sharp should have not been cast as the lead. Perhaps someone more seasoned would have made this film more appealing. It was however a pleasant surprise to see Gillian Anderson a.k.a X-Files' Scully, and she of course nailed her role.

I can see many people slamming this film, especially if they hate math, and because it's not your typical Hollywood production. Had there been narrating, it would have made for a great documentary type film. This felt more like one of those "based on a true story" films. Nothing spectacular, but still interesting enough to watch and make you think.

Nevertheless, still enjoyable and refreshing to see something different, even if not Hollywood-ish. Would I recommend it? Yes. Would I see it again? Probably not.