Visitors - I nuovi extraterrestri

Yeah. "The Pod People" is a movie that is so extremely bad, you'll OK the TV and yell out at the top of your lungs, "It stinks!!!!!!" I've compared this movie with other kid versus alien family movies from the 1980s such as "E.T. The Extra-terrestrial" and the lovable "Mac and Me," and what do both of those movies have that "The Pod People" is missing from sight? A good, well thought out story, innovation, happiness, and not being able to get depression within a single viewing, of course! So do not, I repeat, do not watch "The Pod People" without Joel and the Bots of "Mystery Science Theater 3000," because after watching the MST3K version, I couldn't imagine what this movie would be like without the funny commentary!

Says one of the many annoying characters that populate this really stupid movie. Something comes to earth and lands in the woods next to a cabin inhabited by a high pitched boy who has a thing for animals, his mother and some old cranky guy. There's also poachers running around, and pretty soon there's a group of teenagers driving around. Eventually they all wind up getting killed by the aliens. Well, not all of them, which is unfortunate because then the movie would be over in thirty minutes! Watch this stinker with Joel, Tom and Crow and laugh along at this really, really bad movie. As Tom would say "Huzzah!"

They say that no good deed goes unpunished. This movie - or should I say "this swill" - shows that to be 100% true. Spielberg made "E.T." and someone made "Los nuevos extraterrestres" (called "Pod People" in the United States) in response. The movie has a boy befriending an alien who looks sort of like an anteater, and some weird things result. WHY CAN'T ALIENS KIDNAP THE PEOPLE WHO MAKE THESE KINDS OF MOVIES?! There are plenty of good stories out there and they have to go and make this?!

That said, the movie was not a complete waste. Quite the opposite: "MST3K" once showed it. As you might imagine, Joel, Servo and Crow have lots of fun with it.

My favorite scene was the part where the tiny cat starts chomping on Trumpy's nose and wont let go. The actor tries to play it cool by moving along and ignoring it, but the cat is persistent. Everything else was wacky beyond description and the plot was looser than a wet noodle

Oh, how I love this, the movie that introduced me to the work of Juan Piquer Simon, one of the best "bad" directors ever. It was also the very first episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 I ever saw, way back when, so it will always have a special place in my heart. Although this version of his movie was run through the Film Ventures International ringer (a company that takes movies and re-edits them, adding new music & credits), Simon's style shines through. There's also the usual Juan Piquer Simon stable of actors, including Ian Sera (Kendle in "Pieces") and Frank Brana (the guy who says "You don't have the authority to declare Happy Birthday!" in "Slugs").

The movie is about some poachers who encounter some strange eggs in the woods- no wait, it's about a rockin' rock-n-roll band who are going on a camping trip- no, wait, it's about an animal-loving red-haired kid named Tommy who lives with his unpleasant aunt and uncle deep in the woods. Eventually all these tales converge when Trumpy, a lovable fuzzy alien with an odd shaped head and phallic snout, hatches out of one the aforementioned strange eggs.

Tommy takes in Trumpy and teaches him the joys of jigsaw puzzles and eating peanuts (which Trumpy sucks through his snout, which should be charming but is ultimately a creepy image). Unfortunately, another alien who looks exactly like Trumpy is on a killing spree, and a case of mistaken identity could land Trumpy on the business end of alcoholic Uncle Joe's shotgun!

This is a pleasantly dumb movie, full of dumb characters and dumber dialog ("Oh yeah? Well, you're a jerk!" says Brana to his bearded sidekick). Trumpy is cool, especially when he does "magic things" like stand on the ceiling, make Tommy's laundry fly through the air, and turn an old Simon game into a slammin' beat box (Mix Master Trumpy's jams would later be pilfered by Moby, The Beastie Boys, and others). Also putting in an appearance is a picture of Ronald Reagan, which completely fooled me into thinking this was an American movie.

The MST3K episode featuring this masterpiece is available on video from Rhino, and no fan of absurd cinema should be without it!