Like a meteor destined for Earth, “Alien Trespass” is aimed squarely at the audience that grew up watching 1950s sci-fi pictures on late-night TV.
Not that I would know anything about that, of course. But, ah, if I were one of those people, I would say this movie hits the necessary targets.
Alien-invasion pictures need a Southwest setting, a pipe-smoking scientist with a large backyard telescope and preferably some kind of episode involving a giant creature. “Alien Trespass” delivers on all points.
While putting hubcap-sized steaks on the backyard barbecue one night, Dr. Ted Lewis (Eric McCormack) sees a UFO crash into a nearby hillside. While investigating, his body is taken over by an alien life force, a monotone presence that makes his wife (Jody Thompson) suspicious.
Other townsfolk are curious, too. Especially sharp is a waitress (Jenni Baird), who comes to understand Ted/alien in a very special way. Of course there are teens — you have to have some teen characters, because you’ve got to appeal to the young audience that will be seeing this movie at the drive-in theater.
Hmm. You know, this is one of the problems for the amiable, cleverly written “Alien Trespass.” Only people of a certain age will really get all the jokes, if it’s a straight parody of a particular kind of movie that’s as dead as the drive-in craze. So it has to be effective, at least a little bit, as a straight movie, despite being a spoof.
And the filmmakers like the genre too much to really camp it up. Which I admire them for, but it makes the film a somewhat vanilla experience.
“Alien Trespass” was directed by “X-Files” executive producer R.W. Goodwin and written by Steven P. Fisher, and it was shot in British Columbia, which doubles surprisingly well for the Southwestern desert.
McCormack, the longtime “Will &Grace” star, is amusingly tamped-down as the rock-jawed professor, and the rest of the cast, including in-tune character actors Dan Lauria and Robert Patrick as town cops, are also on the wavelength.
If you like this kind of deal, also check out “The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra,” a hilarious 2001 send-up of the same kind of movie. I guess there’ll always be an audience for parodies of this kind, although the possibilities of spoofing “The Last House on the Left” 50 years from now seem remote.
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