O Caso Betty e Barney

The UFO Incident was one of the hardest movies for me to see. I remember when it first aired, I had to be at a Boy Scout meeting, so I missed it (back in those pre-VCR days). The second chance I had to see it had the station broadcasting it go off the air for a half-hour, and then come back on with a completely fuzzed out picture, so again I couldn't watch the film. I procured a copy last month, and then I lost the bloody tape. I managed to finally get another and FINALLY got to watch the damn thing.

Well, it really was worth the wait. James Earl Jones and Estelle Parsons give very believeable and very moving performances as a married couple beset by completely strange and frightening circumstances. Even if you don't believe in the alien abduction phenomenon that has become so widespread after the big-budget version of Whitley Streiber's Communion, you've got to admire the acting abilities of both stars in this movie. You can definitely feel the pain and confusion that Barney and Betty Hill went through in their performances (particularly Jones, who I think accurately encapsulates all of the pent-up frustrations that Barney Hill was reputed to have, though he did so in a decidedly non-stereotypical way - Barney wasn't your average "Angry Black Man" of the seventies).

I suppose because of Communion (and the recent Signs) one might chuckle a bit at the alien visitors in this movie, but one has to remember that this was a made-for-TV movie and I think the production values put it on a par with any of the contemporary science fiction or horror films of the time period. One also has to remember this movie was made before that famous cover of Communion was published, so the aliens don't quite look like the willowy Greys that most folks have come to associate with the phenomenon.

This is a film definitely worth searching out. Sci-Fi Channel apparently shows it now and again, so that's your best bet, outside of the internet trading circles (which is where I got my copy).

I first vievved this movie several years ago on a Cable television channel. I vvas so pleased vvith the acting abilities of James Earl Jones and Estelle Parsons vvho play Betty and Barney Hill that I sought the movie to tape record it. I am still trying to catch it. The impression it made on me vvas a strong one. It vvas full of highly emotional drama. And it made me respect James Earl Jones all the more. Estelle Parson did a vvonderful job playing the vvife. Both characters vvere stretched and there vvas a lot of dialogue. Not too much action. But there really vvasn't need for action vvhen your glued to the screen vvaiting to hear vvhat the characters vvill say next of their tramatic experience. The dialogue and outpouring emotions vvas the action. This is a vvonderful movie. I'd really like to see it again.

James Earl Jones gives a memorable, highly sympathetic performance as Barney Hill, and Estelle Parsons as his wife Betty matches him, moment for moment.

This is a harrowing tale, based on a true story (one which heralds the modern era of alien abduction accounts). Barnard Hughes is entirely believable as the psychiatrist who tries to help the couple. The "special effects" are refreshingly not-so-special, the absolutely outrageous events depicted un-hysterically in flashbacks. I loved the entities' eyes: human-seeming, with pupils and whites but magnified, as if covered with big lenses--highlighting one distinction between the Hills' descriptions and all those more recent "grays" with their huge, oval, entirely black eyes. The treatment is intelligently grounded in the reality of the couple's seeking help for their anxieties and sleeplessness ( their initial focus) rather than the "sci-fi" elements of the story.

And not since Edna Mae Oliver bawled the name of her dead husband Barney in "Drums Along The Mohawk" (1939) has there been heard anywhere a more New Englandy pronunciation of that name than Ms. Parsons delivers here!!

This movie is very closely based on the true story. I can attest to this, because I have a unique relationship to it. I was 9 years old in October, 1965, when our 4th grade math teacher rolled in the 21" TV to our classroom abruptly one afternoon, and displayed a live interview on local Boston TV with the Hills. Betty Hill described, verbatim, what the movie depicts, except she was much more detailed in the TV interview, which lasted nearly an hour. What she said was so impressive, I never forgot it for the rest of my life. She is the rarest of abductees, in the sense that she had a lucid conversation with her abductors. I believed every word she said then, and I have believed it for 45 years since, without the slightest modicum of doubt. As to the movie itself, I cannot imagine more perfect casting than Estelle Parsons and James Earl Jones. They were made for these parts. If you have ever seen the real Hills in an interview, the resemblance is uncanny. The film pays strict attention to detail and is well made. It took guts for these people to go public, and even more to make a movie that didn't distort the story to the tastes of greedy Hollywood execs. For a low budgeted TV movie, this is more like a superb documentary.

This movie caught my eye because I remember reading about Betty and Barney Hill as a young UFO freak. They were the first famous case of alleged UFO abduction. This film is very well done, really effectively resting on the performances of the two leads. They believably portray real people under very unreal circumstances. I'd love to see it again if I could ever find it!