Earth is being invaded! Everyone grab a bat!

Rating: 5/10 (11 August 2004)

Some minor spoilage is contained herein.
Perhaps it is a testament to M. Night Shyamalan that he can put us on the edge of our seats over nothing at all. In "Signs", he masterfully creates strong suspense inspired by a not-so-strong antagonist.
When we think of hostile aliens invading Earth, we may picture such scenarios as "War of the Worlds", or some other variation of the "death-ray toting, destroy all human life" scheme. "Signs" decides to take a different approach. But never fear; what these aliens lack in sophisticated technology, they more than make up for in navigational ability. Crop circles, of course, are not elaborate hoaxes, but actually road maps for alien invaders. From what facts can be gathered in the movie, they roughly translate to "Attack somewhere around here".
In movies such as "Independence Day", the aliens wisely began by destroying major population centers such as New York and L.A. The effect of their elaborate crop beacons in "Signs" seems to be to direct invaders to small farmhouses across the world. I don't want to pretend that I'm smarter than an alien, but perhaps there are better indicators of major population centers than crop circles (Hint: Look for the big bright lights).
The point of my seemingly incessant rambling is to note that this movie lacks believable baddies. From our very first glimpse of the aliens in a very bigfootesque home video, we almost want to laugh at them. It's just hard to be frightened by creatures that can easily be subdued with a blunt object.