Wait for Cable

Rating: Null/10 (5 August 2002)

WARNING!
***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***
You should know I was predisposed to like this movie. I Like Mel Gibson and I enjoyed THE SIXTH SENSE.
But the problems with this movie just sort of pile up.
Some people call Mel's character, Graham Hess, "Father". HUH? Who besides Roman Catholics would call a former reverend father? Episcopalians? Greek Orthodox? How exactly did this former priest get a farm? Did he suddenly take up farming after his wife died six months previously? That's a pretty good trick, taking up farming and putting in a crop of corn when your wife dies , you lose your faith, and you are in a Dis functional depression.
And you don't have a single tractor or even a pick up truck.
Do they have Chickens? Hogs? Heck no.
OK, never mind that. Willing suspension of disbelief.
How many movies are shamelessly cribbed from, here? FIELD OF DREAMS, CHILDREN OF THE CORN, NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD,
BLAIR WITCH PROJECT, and WIZARD OF OZ.
Once or twice is an HOMAGE, more than that and you are making an AIRPLANE - like spoof.
There are some funny and suspenseful moments, to be sure. But That is really just the usual tricks that Bruckheimer, Spielberg, et al beat you over the head with. What suspense there is, has been copied from Hitchcock, and honestly... it did keep me interested even through the confusion.
Any "message" to be had here (blink and you miss it) is the part where Mel tells his brother that we can either look at this as "just lucky", or "miraculous"....
Now hold on folks.... Can anybody miss that one of Mel's two dogs has already gotten killed? The second one gets killed at the end of the movie. If any body is in doubt as to the malevolence of a movie villain... this clinches it!
Lucky or miraculous are not the feelings to be suggesting.
The thing that just drives me nuts through half the movie is that on a farm, in America.... when Mel is boarding up the windows and they are trying to defend themselves against the malevolent aliens, there is not a rifle or shotgun to be found?!
This is as unbelievable as a high level executive with Mitsubishi in Osaka going to work wearing a cowboy hat and a couple six shooters.
Maybe city dwellers in New York, Philadelphia, or EL-LAY think that a Louisville slugger is the best defense when 911 doesn't work, people in rural areas are a bit more equipped than this movie suggests.
In conclusion, the aliens put these crop circles here as navigational aids for their subsequent invasion. They don't destroy cities, the various militaries of the Earth are fairly powerless to engage them.... they seem to only be raiding literally handfuls of people close to their crop circles, and they leave for no discernible reason. Swell. All this so that Mel Gibson can regain his faith and go back to the Church. I came for a roller coaster and all I got was three speed bumps.
If you haven't seen this already, I advise you to wait for it to come to cable, it just isn't worth $8.50.