Aliens in the Attic

Aliens in the Attic is a 2009 American comic science fiction film directed by John Schultz and written by Mark Burton and Adam F. Goldberg, based on an original story conceived by Burton. Starring Carter Jenkins, Austin Butler, Ashley Tisdale, Gillian Vigman, Andy Richter, Doris Roberts, Robert Hoffman, Kevin Nealon, Tim Meadows, Josh Peck, J. K. Simmons, Kari Wahlgren and Thomas Haden Church, the plot revolves around the children in the Pearson family defending their vacation home against a group of aliens, who are planning an invasion of Earth until one of the aliens betrays them and joins the Pearson children in battle.
Produced by Regency Enterprises and Dune Entertainment, Aliens in the Attic was released theatrically by 20th Century Fox on July 31, 2009, in the United States. The film received mixed reviews from film critics, but failed at the box office, earning merely $57.9 million on a $45 million budget.
Plot
A meteor shower rockets through the dark galaxy, and four glowing pods hide behind it. Suddenly the pods make a hard right and head towards the distant planet Earth.
In a Chicago suburb, Stuart Pearson (Kevin Nealon) and his wife Nina (Gillian Vigman) head a family that includes 7-year-old Hannah (Ashley Boettcher), 17-year-old Bethany (Ashley Tisdale), who sneaks out with her boyfriend Ricky Dillman (Robert Hoffman), and 15-year-old techno-geek Tom (Carter Jenkins). After arguing with Tom over changing his grades on his school's website, Stuart takes the family to a rented lakeside vacation house in Creek Landing, Michigan. Joining them is Nathan "Nate" Pearson (Andy Richter), his 14-year-old show off son Jake (Austin Butler), identical 12-year-old gamer twins Art (Henri Young) and Lee (Regan Young), and Nana Rose (Doris Roberts). Ricky also arrives unexpectedly and talks his way into staying overnight, by faking his car broke down.
As the family settles in, dark storm clouds swirl around the house and the four glowing pods land on its roof. A crew of little aliens emerges: consisting of Skip (J. K. Simmons), a nasty and tough commander, Tazer (Thomas Haden Church), an ugly muscle-bound soldier armed to the teeth, Razor (Kari Wahlgren), a violent female soldier, and Sparks (Josh Peck), a four-armed engineer and the only non-threatening member. As the aliens crash into the satellite dish, Ricky and Tom volunteer to fix it. In the attic, Ricky then reveals to Tom that he lied about his car breaking down and being 18. He is actually in college and four years older than Bethany. Ricky sends Tom to fix the satellite dish by himself, but it is smashed. Investigating further, Tom and Jake discover the aliens. Ricky is shot by Tazer with a dart-like "mind control plug", so the aliens can control him via remote.
The "Zirkonians" plan to take over Earth and make Ricky attack the boys, but Tom and Jake escape with Hannah and the twins' help. Tazer shoots them with mind control plugs, but they fall off harmlessly, as they do not work on kids. The group calls 911, but sheriff Doug Armstrong (Tim Meadows), doesn't believe them and scolds them while the aliens cut the phone wire. The kids decide to protect the adults by keeping the aliens' existence a secret. Tom creates a potato gun to repel the first alien attack from the attic. In the process, they obtain Ricky's controller and turn him against the aliens. The mind-controlled Ricky's actions begin to tear apart his relationship with Bethany.
The kids get the adults out of the house and then ambush the aliens as they try to reach the basement via the air vents. Gentle and non-violent Sparks gets separated from the group and ends up in Hannah's room. She befriends him and he reveals that he wants to return to his family as he is being forced to help with the invasion. Sparks creates weapons for the kids and reveals they are seeking the "Sizematron", a machine buried under the basement for many years that will allow the Zirkonians to invade the planet. The kids' grandmother is mind controlled by the aliens, giving her superhuman strength and agility. Razor believes he's taking Sparks, but the pink suitcase that he was hiding in was actually empty. The kids take the commander hostage in a box. The sheriff shows up and asks to see what's in the box, however the adults' arrival distract him as they invite him to dinner.
At dinner, the commander escapes from the box and takes Ricky's controller and Hannah's bag with Sparks inside. Nana, under the twins' control, defeats Ricky (back under alien control) similar to a fighting video game. However, the aliens capture Jake and Sparks, whom they need to complete their mission, while Bethany discovers the aliens. While rescuing Jake in the basement, Ricky insults Tom and the others and breaks up with Bethany, who finally sees his true colors. The kids attack the aliens and rescue Sparks, although Skip successfully uses the Sizematron, growing 30 feet tall and summoning the Zirkonian invasion ships. The kids use the mind control to sending him and Tazer back to the machine to shrink them. Tazer and Razor (now in love) flee, while Skip is sucked into the damaged machine, which explodes. Sparks calls off the invasion and returns home to Zirkon after bidding farewell to the kids. Having grown closer, the kids resume their vacation, fishing with their parents, while Skip, having survived the explosion yet shrunk to an even smaller size, reappears and bent on revenge, only to be snatched away by a crow and meets his demise.
In a mid-credits scene, Bethany and Tom use the mind control remote and take revenge on Ricky to make him act extremely weirdly in front of his new girlfriend Annie Filkins. Bethany gleefully says she is "so keeping this" after Ricky lands in his testicles on a stair rail.
Cast
Carter Jenkins as Thomas "Tom" Pearson
Austin Butler as Jake Pearson
Ashley Tisdale as Bethany Pearson
Ashley Boettcher as Hannah Pearson
Robert Hoffman as Richard "Ricky" Dillman
Henri Young as Art Pearson
Regan Young as Lee Pearson
Kevin Nealon as Stuart "Stu" Pearson
Gillian Vigman as Nina Pearson
Andy Richter as Nate Pearson
Doris Roberts as Nana Rose Pearson
Tim Meadows as Sheriff Doug Armstrong
Malese Jow as Julie
Megan Parker as Brooke
Maggie VandenBerghe as Annie Filkins
Voice cast
Josh Peck as Sparks
J. K. Simmons as Skip
Thomas Haden Church as Tazer
Kari Wahlgren as Razor
Production
Development
In March 2006, 20th Century Fox announced that they picked up Mark Burton and Adam F. Goldberg's script for the film, then titled They Came from Upstairs. Marc Resteghini was hired to oversee the film for Fox with Kara Francis Smith for Regency Enterprises. Barry Josephson was confirmed as the main producer for the film while Thor Freudenthal was initially hired to direct the film, but was later replaced by John Schultz. Pre-production on the film began in March 2007.
In January 2008, Ashley Tisdale was cast in the film as Bethany Pearson; Robert Hoffman, Carter Jenkins and Austin Butler were later cast as well. Doris Roberts signed onto the film in February 2008. MTV later confirmed that Josh Peck joined the cast as the voice of the alien Sparks. Tisdale recorded a song titled "Switch" for the film, which was also included in her second album, Guilty Pleasure. The original motion picture soundtrack was released on August 18, 2009.
Filming
Principal photography began at the end of January 2008 in Auckland, New Zealand. Auckland-based production company New Upstairs Productions stated that filming would run for 30–40 days from January 28 to April 18, 2008, with no filming in weekends. The film was shot in a rambling old villa transported from Remuera to a farm in North Auckland. The main set was an old manor and the crew spent $700,000 restoring the house. Principal photography ended in mid-March 2008, though Tisdale, Butler and Jenkins returned to the set for reshoots in April 2009.
Release
Aliens in the Attic was originally scheduled to be released in January 2009, but was pushed back to July 31, 2009. The United Kingdom release also coincided with a charity auction for Save the Children which teamed up with eBay and 20th Century Fox where various celebrities, including several actors from the film, sold items from their attics to raise money for the charity.
Home media
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on November 3, 2009.
Reception
Critical response
Reviews of Aliens in the Attic were mixed; the film holds a 34% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 74 reviews with an average critical score of 4.60/10, with the consensus stating: "Inoffensive and kid-friendly, this mundane family comedy is light on imagination." On Metacritic, the film has an average score of 42 out of 100 based on 10 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.
Entertainment Weekly described the film as "a pointless and harmless family adventure that doesn't mentally assault the 12-and-over set and looks like a lot of fun", while San Francisco Chronicle called it unoriginal and crowd pleasing. Variety stated the film would appeal primarily to a more narrow demographic of tweens and preteens and despite Tisdale's presence, it's difficult to imagine many ticket buyers between the ages of 12 and 18 while The New York Times described Jenkins and Butler as the actors with more personality and Hoffman as the actor who provides the film's occasional funny moments and stated that even though she is credited as one of the main characters, Tisdale spends most of the film off-screen.
The Los Angeles Times called the film "an enjoyable kid-friendly film but not an out-of-this-world classic" and also mentioned the film belonged to Hoffman, and Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter said director John Schultz "played everything for laughs and earns a more than a few but tech effects deliver a fair number of those laughs" and described the film as an "amusing family comedy". Radio Times gave the film a three out of five stars rating, saying that the film is "a thrilling children's yarn with enough pop-culture references to hold grown-ups' interest".
The Dove Foundation praised the film, saying it is "one of those movies that you find to be better than anticipated" and also said the film draws on realism in family dynamics. Lara Martin of Digital Spy described the film as a "kid-friendly mix of Men in Black crossed with Gremlins with a healthy dose of Home Alone-style violence" and also mentioned that one of the biggest disappointments in the movie is the lack of screen time given to Tisdale, billed as one of the leading actors, who "gets a promising start as she rebels against her parents and struts around in her bikini, but she's quickly relegated to background fodder purely there to provide excess opportunities for the alien-controlled Ricky to shine" and concluded saying it seems "a bizarre and sad waste of her obvious comedic talent". The Miami Herald gave the film a mixed review, describing it as a "children's movie mix of live-action and animation, it has a few positive messages, a few laughs and a few comic throwdowns".
Box office
Aliens in the Attic grossed $8 million its opening weekend while playing in 3,108 theaters, ranking No. 5 at the North American box office. The film ended its theatrical run on November 22, 2009, having grossed $25,200,412 domestically and $32,680,644 overseas for a worldwide total of $57,881,056.
Accolades
2009 Teen Choice Awards
Movie Star: Female – Ashley Tisdale (Nomination)
2010 Young Artist Awards
Young Ensemble Cast: Megan Parker, Henri Young, Regan Young, Austin Robert Butler, Carter Jenkins (Nomination)
Video game
A video game based on the movie of the same name that was released on August 4, 2009, in North America, followed by an international release on August 6, 2009. The game developers were Revistronic for the Wii, PlayStation 2, and Microsoft Windows platforms and Engine Software for the Nintendo DS, published by Playlogic. The game features follow the storyline of the movie and it was available for Wii, PlayStation 2, Nintendo DS, and Microsoft Windows. The Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable versions were planned, but they are cancelled. The game also offers players two different gameplay perspectives depending upon which video game platform players choose. The game allows to play as Tom, Hannah, Jake, Art, Lee, Bethany or Sparks, Skip, Tazer and Razor across 15 missions.
References
External links
Alien 2009 films
2000s English-language films
2009 comedy films
2000s science fiction comedy films
2000s children's comedy films
American science fiction comedy films
American children's comedy films
Films set in Michigan
Films shot in New Zealand
Films scored by John Debney
Alien invasions in films
Regency Enterprises films
Dune Entertainment films
20th Century Fox films
Films directed by John Schultz (director)
2000s American films
Cancelled PlayStation Portable games
Cancelled PlayStation 3 games
Cancelled Xbox 360 games
Films about children
Films about extraterrestrial life
American films about revenge
Films about size change
Films about vacationing
Nintendo DS games
PlayStation 2 games
Wii games
Windows games s in the Attic at Common Sense Media