Roswell: The Aliens Attack

Two aliens, a man and a woman, come to Earth wanting to blow it up (you can tell they're aliens because they can turn their eyes green). The man alien befriends a woman and her son and changes his mind, but the evil woman alien stays with the mission, while dabbling in prostitution. Then the man alien has to stop her.

The corniest part of the movie is the little hand-held tool the aliens use. It apparently can do ANYTHING. All you have to do is hold it up, and it does what you want: uses tiny lasers to pinpoint a specific location on a paper road map, shoots people, whatever. Exactly what kind of technology is THAT? Why couldn't the aliens just hold it up and command it to blow up the earth? Instead they have to go to a military base and "recharge" an atomic bomb.

Definitely not high-quality material, but it's one of those movies to watch late at night when nothing else is on. I watched it just to see what happened, which I guess is good, because it means the movie kept my interest. I'll give it a solid 5/10 stars for giving me something to do.

Let's say, there is a UFO falling from the sky. There's a man laying on the ground miles from civilization, without transportation. This man claims to be a hot-shot scientist, but acts weird, only knows a couple of words in English and doesn't understand a simple joke or remark. What do you do?

The answer is: you fall in love with him! This is what the widowed Katie does anyway, although one wonders why, as alien John's only contribution to their conversations is 'yes' or 'no' (although a cynic would say that's the perfect partner). Good thing though that the aliens apparently speak English to each other, it's the best way to learn the language, folks...

Oh I forgot what the aliens (there's 2 of them, John and a female) want. Well, what do all aliens want... they want to destroy the planet. To do so they recharge an atomic bomb (?) so that the whole world will explode (erm... I didn't get that either). This bomb is on a military base in Roswell, New Mexico, home of the UFO.

Back to the story then. Conflicts start when alien-guy John likes Katie and her son as well and thinks this whole blowing-up-the-planet thing is immoral. His female buddy from outer space Eve thinks otherwise though... Meanwhile the military guys find out he's an imposter (finally checked his records, guys?), while the bomb keeps ticking...

Now John and Katie team up to find Eve and stop her from detonating the bomb. Love it when John tells Katie he's an alien: 'I came here to destroy the planet, but I changed my mind (!)'. From that point the movie which is already ludicrous takes some more stupid turns, which includes a silly fight and a countdown-sequence you only see in old Bond movies, but then worse. Notice this: it takes that stupid bomb about 30 seconds to verify (!) a code...

The actors try but this pile of dung can't be saved, no matter what actors you'd use. Kate Greenhouse is a Heather Nova look-a-like (anybody else notice), playing the Katie person and Steven Flynn has no problems using a single facial impression on the John guy. But that's not where the movie goes wrong. We're way past that point...

A cheap TV movie, this one: 2/10.

This was packaged pretty well and promised an interesting spin on an interesting story - the alleged discovery and subsequent cover-up of a crashed alien spacecraft in New Mexico 1947. Anyway what you get is rubbish of the highest order and as soon as the cheap "fluoro green eyes" special effect is used to identify the aliens then you know what you're in for. Two human shaped aliens walk out of the crash - one male the other female. Well the male falls in love with a widowed airforce base worker and the female goes on a sex spree, and there is much disagreement between male and female on whether to blow up the earth. Won't give away the ending but it is so loaded with sweetness you'll want to be sick. There's also a hand-held alien gadget which shoots people, uploads information, downloads information, fries peoples brains, and heals people (most with a voice that sounds like the "good morning" you hear in some elevators).

Take my advice - give this one a wide berth ...

The best aspect of Roswell: The Aliens Attack is Kate Greenhouse, she is very good in her role and is beautiful to boot. The supporting roles of Brent Stait, Sean McCann and Donnelly Rhodes are also well taken. Not all the acting is as successful. Steven Flynn plays a character that is too nice and somewhat too compassionate and is unconvincing even doing that, he is very stiff throughout with a very limited emotional range. Heather Hanson is not helped by a character that is so vapid that it borders on absurdity, but while she is good doing sultry and seductive that's all she's good at seemingly. Visually it is not exactly amateurish but there's never really much that comes across as interesting, and we got the message very quickly that Kate Greenhouse was a beauty, we didn't need as many shots and close-ups as we did. The special effects are wisely used sparsely but that seemed to be an excuse to not put effort into constructing them at the same time. The soundtrack tended to be on the heavy and pedestrian side, nothing much that was memorable or subtly done. The dialogue is contrived and rather cheesy, with Heather Hanson's lines especially cringe-worthy, a lot of it is stuff that we've heard before but better incorporated and delivered, while the direction is flat in character and plodding. Narratively, Roswell: The Aliens Attack is a mess. The moral conflict is not convincing, not helped by a too-nice lead character, the tension and drama is contrived and lacking in suspense, the ending is so overly-sentimental and saccharine that it will induce toothache, and in the end all of it was predictable, ham-fisted and dull. There are some good enough ideas here, but they're never elaborated upon, such a shameful waste of good potential. The characters are not the obnoxious kind, but rather underdeveloped and devoid of personality. Overall, a very poor movie but the acting from most is quite good. 2/10 Bethany Cox

In 1947, in Roswell, New Mexico, after a collision in the sky, two alien spacecrafts, one of them intact, and two dead gray small aliens are retrieved by and stored in a military base, waiting for some experts from Washington to analyze what they might be. Meanwhile, two aliens having human appearance arrive in the military base, both of them with a mission of activating a nuclear bomb and destroy Earth planet. While increasing the power of the weapon and preparing to activate it, the alien John Deerman (Steven Flynn) meets and likes the local widow Katie Harras (Greenhouse) and her son, Sam, and decides not destroying the planet. However, the other one, the sexy Eve (Heather Hanson), keeps resolute in the original plan of blowing up the planet. "Roswell: The Aliens Attack" is not a masterpiece or a movie to be nominated to an Oscar. Although using elements of many sci-fi stories, mainly the romance of "Starman", it is a good film. There are flaws in the story, but it is also very attractive and in the end it is a good entertainment. I believe that real fans of this genre will not be disappointed. There are some unfair reviews in IMDb. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Roswell: Ataque Alienígena" ("Roswell: Alien Attack")