Wadda cheap alien!

Rating: Null/10 (4 August 2002)

I wanted to love this movie. I really did. First of all, it was made in my backyard. Well, close enough to my backyard. I'm a lifelong resident of Bucks County, PA. Plus, crop circles, aliens, Mel Gibson and the writer/director of The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable?!? Can you get any better than that? Well, yeah. Given a really bad script, and a story that ultimately becomes totally contrived and cheesy, you could get a lot better. ***Spoilers: Although I'm not really sure that I could spoil this movie anymore than Shamalan did.*** Mel Gibson is a ex-protestant priest who turns his back on his faith - or faith in general - following the accidental death of his wife. He's a farmer, and the movie begins with him and his children finding crop circles in their corn fields - signs that we are not alone? At first, Gibson and his younger brother, played by Phoenix, decide that the strange events occuring around them are the result of pranksters. But things begin to spin out of control, and the film's characters are soon led to believe that the earth is being invaded by ETs. Gibson and Phoenix board the windows and doors of their home. The family hides in the basement and they wait for the aliens. The final showdown occurs when the family exits their basement b/c the invasion is seemingly over and Gibson's son is in desprite need of asthma medication. A really cheap looking alien hovers in their kitchen, and takes Gibson's son hostage w/ mustard gas and a needle that extends from his palm. Words that Gibson's wife spoke shortly before her death take meaning, and the alien is defeated by Phoenix wielding a bat...and WATER?!? Please! It's obvious that Shamalan was trying to craft a tale about losing and finding faith in the context of the supernatural, but the script w/ its corny ending just doesn't work. There were plenty of plot holes! E.g., why would hostile aliens w/ a weakness for water choose to invade a planet that is 2/3 water?!? The movie's only plus is the acting. Gibson does a beautiful, subtle job w/ Graham Hess, and Abigail Breslin is wonderful as his daughter. Where the Sixth Sense was ingenious, and Unbreakable was subtle, Signs is ultimately a joke. (I truly think that the alien in the bad green hulk costume was suppose to be a CGI stand-in...but they ran out of money to do the tech work.) The climax was SO bad! A plot twist in which the invasion was a hoax would have been more satisfing, although predictable. It's so disappointing that all the signs in this movie added up to so little. ** out of 5