The film opens with a 1950’s style Sci Fi film on the screen, making us believe that the film will begin on earth until the general turns around and we see the antennae. After that there is a brief look at the suburb in which the story takes place. The whole planet is living in the 50’s, with the dress, the language, the way of life. We then meet Lem, trying to get a job at the local planetarium. It is there that Lem’s best friend Skiff, an alien obsessed comic book guy, scares the little kids into thinking that aliens take their brains and eat it for breakfast. They are really narrowed minded and not open to other suggestions.

Lem wants to have the perfect job, the perfect life, living with the girl of his dreams, Neera, who lives next door. However two things go wrong for him, a guy named Glar who is well ahead of his time protesting, promoting peace, owning a hippy van and who Neera believes is doing an admirable thing, and the arrival of the UFO in his back yard. This is the space craft in which Charles (Chuck) T. Baker arrives in, believing that the planet is uninhabitable due to a Rover drone whose secondary mission was to collect rocks. The military is called under the command of General Grawl and a scientist who wants to take their brains, Professor Kripple.

This defiantly a film for young and old as I was sitting next to a boy who looked around 3 and thought that he would be chatting the whole way through it, but the only time I heard him was near the end when he figured out that the movie was almost over, and not in a bad way and his father was laughing at most of the jokes. The dog of the planet looks like the alien from ‘Alien’ complete with acid urine and is given the name Ripley. There are references to anal probing and other adult humor. The Star Wars were done well, with Chuck at one point quoting two lines from a new hope to entertain his new friends while being filmed by the out side world. There was also a moment where he likened Lem to Luke Skywalker after they rescued him from base 9, the alien’s version of area 51.

The cast was brilliant. The Rock was great as Chuck, Justin Long was Lem and also provided the vocal effects of Rover, Seann Will Scott as Skiff and Jessica Biel as Nerra. Gary Oldman was General Grawl, he played the part really well and an animated film can not go wrong with having John Cleese as Professor Kripple wanting to take there brains.

I give this movie a cool +. Great humor, great story and for it in not being in 3-D. I liken it to Flushed Away, enough in the film to keep the adult happy and to keep the children entertained

Trailer

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I’m not exactly Johnny on the spot with this review, but since it was the last thing I saw in theaters (and possibly the only ËœSummer Ëœ09′ film I’ll bother with theatrically) I figured I should at least try to knock together a review.

After an opening set in 1968, in which a young boy is the subject of a séance in which a medium unsuccessfully attempts to thwart a demon’s efforts to take his soul, we jump to present day to meet our heroine.

Christine (Lohman) is a loan officer angling for a promotion, though her inherently nice personality is working against her in the race for a promotion against another employee, and her boss has no problems with playing that to his advantage at every turn. When she asks him about the promotion, he tells her that he’s just not sure if she has what it takes to make the tough, unpleasant decisions that the position would require.

Left to mull that one over, Christine finds herself confronted with a disheveled (and wholly repulsive, if one is being honest) Gypsy woman named Mrs. Ganush (Raver), who is on the verge of losing her home. Ganush explains her situation being due to an illness, and desperately asks for a third extension on her mortgage. Seeing this as her opportunity to prove herself to her manager, and obviously against her instincts, Christine tells her that there’s nothing that she can do, which very nearly drives the old woman Ëœround the bend.

Mrs. Ganush throws herself to the floor, begging her to help her, telling her that she’s a proud woman, but for this she’s willing to beg, even tugging and kissing at the hem of her skirt. When Christine still refuses, she goes absolutely apeshit in traditional Raimi fashion, complete with Deadite sound effects and security forces her from the building.

Christine notices the woman’s car in the parking structure when she leaves for the day and edges towards her own vehicle with caution, only to be attacked by Mrs. Ganush, who is hiding in her back seat. The ensuing struggle includes the best use of a stapler as a weapon I’ve ever seen and ends with Mrs. Ganush tearing a button from Christine’s jacket, which she says a mumbling incantation over before forcing it back into Christine’s hands. After the customary reports are filed with building security, Christine leaves with her boyfriend Clay (Long), who tries to comfort her as best he can, talking her down from her hectic day.

Heading back to their car, Christine is drawn to a fortune teller’s shop, and Clay reluctantly humors her. Rham Jas (Rao), the fortune teller they meet seems at first to be something of the con artist that Clay is expecting, but he quickly becomes visibly troubled and tells her that she has a dark spirit upon her and rushes her out because he is unable to help her.

Clay is the customary skeptic, laughing it off (which I suppose is easy when it’s not your dark spirit) and he drops her back at her house (they have an oddly distant relationship, maintaining separate residences), where she is eventually attacked by an chaotic force, which she only sees as a goat shadow on the walls of her home.

Clay thinks she was attacked by Mrs. Ganush, and a psychologist assures them that she could be reliving her past stress, but after increasingly strange events, Christine goes to the home of Mrs. Ganush to try and sort things out, only to find her relatives holding a wake: the old woman is dead, she ain’t gonna be removing any curses anytime soon folks.

Rham is able to tell her that the demon haunting her is called Lamia, and after three days of torment and abuse, it will take her soul to hell. He eventually employs the services of the medium we saw at the beginning of the film, Shaun San Dena (Barazza) in a desperate bid to trap the demon in another living creature, leading to more Deadit-styled action and a possessed Billy Goat, which is just awesome. Christine fights against time to rid herself of the demon by whatever means necessary, and Raimi puts this waifish little girl through about as much punishment as he does Bruce Campbell in the Evil Dead films, it’s a rather wild ride.

Alison Lohman is great as the girl next door type, and it’s interesting to watch her become increasingly desperate in her situation, as well as her ability to handle the physical abuse she’s put through by the Lamia, it’s a splattery, gross-out filled film and she comes through it like a trooper.

Sam Raimi has made a fun little film that has as many laughs as it does chills, even if lots of said chills are the somewhat cheap jump-scares: he still makes it fun.

Give it a look.

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