Alien Abduction: Incident in Lake County

A found footage alien abduction movie that originally aired on the UPN network in January of 1998. Much like the contemporaneous Blair Witch Project, many were convinced it was real. It's very clearly not. The acting is very amateurish. The film is broken up with interviews from experts. One of them, a film director, claims that it has to be real because it has no real plot. The fact is, not only does the film have a very basic horror movie plot, it also has about half a dozen subplots, like mom's alcoholism (the woman carries a wine glass even while running from aliens) or sister's dating a black man. No matter, though. For what it is, it's actually very well done. It's quite frightening. I'm surprised it didn't lead to bigger things for the director. I suspect, given which network it aired on, that almost no one saw it at the time. This is actually the second version of the film. The first was made nine years earlier. Both versions can be found on Youtube.

Yes, it was cheeeeezy. Yes it was fake. Was it a little bit fun? Absolutely. I mean, what were people expecting? A **REAL** documentary from someone's home about an alien invasion?? It was at least creative.

If something like that were to happen, (and I don't mean alien invasion, but maybe a home invasion) do you think that it would be advertised for a week? Look at the Elian Gonzalez story. It was on the news before morning coffee.

It's a 90 min long sci-fi thriller. People take things way too seriously.

It's official, aliens creep me the F out. They're just so damn weird and scary. After the disappointing The Fourth Kind, I decided to revisit this cheap little movie. I remembered it being campy and hokey, but apparently I was wrong. This was a lot scarier than I remembered and did have a fairly natural feel. There were some obvious attempts at character development, which got in the way, such as th forced "Oh, my sisters boyfriend is black and I'm not comfortable with this BLAH BLAH BLAH". Also some of the aliens methods were just pretty confusing, such as making two people kiss. What it does is avoid cheap jump scenes whilst gradually building to a climax of fear.

I find it rather strange how many people can find flaws with this movie.

Many people may think the little girls' acting was too calm for someone her age (if she was actually in the situation of the film). To you I would ask were you just judging the actors abilities or trying to watch the film? If you were watching, you would have seen and understood that she had some sort of connection with the aliens. I did not watch the movie from the very beginning (I missed about 20 minutes), but throughout she was telling the family how to act, as she knew what the aliens were doing. She kept running upstairs, as if by force, trying to see the alien. When Tommy put down the camera she unloaded the shotgun so that if the aliens did come within firing range, they would not get hurt. If you were watching her carefully, you would have seen her drawing aliens, even though she never saw them (correct me if I am wrong, as I said I missed the first 20 minutes). And the concluding story to her so called "calm acting" was when at the end when the aliens walked in she didn't even get drawn to the aliens like the rest, she just walked to join her flock. And if you didn't pick up on this, the choice of putting her photo last out of the whole family (when if you think about it, it should be Tommy), and giving that image more on screen time than the rest shows she had some significance.

When I was about 11 years old, at the time of Blair Witch came (not being able to see it though), I was drawn into the hype as I didn't fully understand how the world worked. For people of about 14 and upwards, you should understand even if video footage was found of a family who have been abducted (and nowhere to be found), the government would never allow it to be released for TV (at least not after many years of working with it). I think most of you already knew this. So you shouldn't watch the movie and complain about the obvious fact its a film made for entertainment! For the time you part of the movie, it is meant to seem real as it makes you emote more. But afterwards you leave the film and realise it was a movie and thought it was a great one at that. The film makers would not deny it was just a film. That phone number before the credits just helps to keep you part of the film.

I can understand how for some people the cuts in the film (where it fades to black then to an expert) can be very annoying, but it effectively heightens the suspense. Just as something creepy happens because of the aliens, the frame pauses just on a really interesting picture. After this you are on the edge of your seat trying to see the aftermath.

I never knew any of these actors when I saw the movie, so maybe I was at an advantage rather than always thinking "Thats the guy from Stargate!". I thought overall it was a great movie, and I was watching in constant suspense. So I think this movie is for any suspense seeker, especially for those who have a craving for some alien invasion.

Okay, now I would like to make the flaws of the movie that are actually important known.

The amount of the light that the camera has available is too much for any flashlight (I believe he is holding one whenever he is outside). Instead I think the night-vision capability should have been used (which is widely available on the market of DV cameras these days). This would have enhanced the element of being made by a teen with a cheap camera. Thats it. After all, again, it was a film, and not real life.

Genuinely scary and gripping from start till end, though still requesting more footage, this film gets a 9/10. A must see, but do not buy (as its one of those films you don't want to regularly watch).

This film is an absolutely brilliant idea executed to perfection. The actors are superbly convincing from beginning to end. I first saw it under the belief that it was supposed to be an actual incident - and this is how the film was intended to be seen. It was years later that I realised it was a film not an actual record of events. Perhaps it is because of this that I found the film so convincing, but it is well worth watching even though you have seen that it is not a record of an actual alien abduction. However, the impact of the film will be lost on you. This does not diminish the skill of the film at all and I congratulate all concerned on conceiving the film and in carrying it off so convincingly.