When Dumber Films Are Made...

Rating: Null/10 (2 June 1999)

This is the most intellectually offensive big-budget science fiction movie I've ever seen. I write science fiction for a living (check the bookstores), and if I ever tried to get away with this kind of drivel, I'd be out of work. Example: E.T. can levitate -- but if he levitates to reach his ship at the start of the movie we have no movie, so he only seems able to levitate after he's been left behind. Example: The mother walks through a kitchen strewn with empty beer cans and doesn't notice them. What mother of a teen-aged kid (or younger) would do that? Example: E.T. dies for no known reason, and then comes back to life, also for no reason. The film is so filled with plot holes and logical flaws, and is so emotionally manipulative, that Spielberg hasn't yet finished paying his penance, even with SCHINDLER'S LIST and SAVING PRIVATE RYAN.