Showdown At Area 51 Movie
Storyline
TAGLINES
The battlefield is here
Two aliens who crash on Earth must find a buried weapon that will destroy the planet and their own society if not stopped.
| Jason London | Jake Townsend |
| Gigi Edgley | Monica Gray |
| Christa Campbell | Charlie Weise |
| Coby Bell | Jude |
| Jahidi White | Kronnan |
| Mel Fair | Tate |
| Brock Roberts | Maj 12 OP 1 |
| Lee Horsley | Diamond Joe Carson |
| Kip Martin | Alex Townsend |
| Tom Lowell | Ranger #1 |
| Michelle Anselmo | TV Reporter |
| Natalie Matias | Jude's Wife |
| Olivia Clift | Little Girl |
| Lorraine Clarkson | Female Driver |
| Dan Gartner | Porch Onlooker |
| C. Roma |
3.70 out of 10 (344 votes)
Visitor Reviews
More holes than script but slightly interesting
posted on 27 Jul 2009gigi edgely and coby bell deliver decent acting considering the horrible script and swiss cheese plot full of holes. both are attractive and manage to deliver their lines pretty convincingly in spite of the preposterous situation.At a fundamental level, the plot has potential. Two aliens, one bad, one good, but you aren't sure which is which until the end of the film. Clues point in different directions (especially the girl on the swing part).It's a low budget flick so don't expect much on special effects. That may be an understatement.The problem is that it is really hard to suspend disbelief when so much of the movie borders on the absurd, and most of the acting is so awful. The frat boy scene introducing the brothers is unconvincing but at least short. The military part at the base is in part ruined by the overacting and unbelievable stupidity of the officer in charge. And then come the aliens, one with tattoos and leathers and the other in something that looks like he crawled out of an army navy surplus store. Hoses are are everywhere. He wears a holey summer shirt with a couple tears that apparently repels armor piercing bullets. It's a see to believe mess.The fights are worse. Bullets are bouncing off the aliens, one of whom has a little shield that he waves around that nobody can miss. An RPG (what is Mr. Redneck doing with an RPG?) is used to threaten one of the aliens, held about 2 feet from him -- as it if wouldn't blow up the hero as well. The clunk clunk fat guy gets delivered in an ice cream truck. No, wait, a bulletproof car comes first, then the ice cream truck which has some awful fake bullet holes in the side. They run through a squad of soldiers like a knife through butter -- somehow the vehicles are bulletproof, then, in one of the funniest scenes of the movie someone hits the rear bumper of the car and it falls off. Just... falls off. Nobody in these elite military squads can hit the tires which survive the entire encounter intact. How much budget does it take to deflate a tire?Its not that bad of a way to pass a boring night, primarily because of edgely (at least if you are male), but I'd have a hard time recommending it to anyone.
Never send Dave to the Blockbuster alone!!!
posted on 20 Apr 2009Do you have one of those friends who takes sadistic pleasure in bringing utterly crappy z-grade sci-fi movies back from the video store? Now you know how I was forced to have this travesty irreparably burned into the synapses of my brain.Anyhow, you may have noted that I gave this utter dreck three out of ten. Was it the utterly unnecessary presence of TV's Matt Houston? Nope. The "I'm in it for the paycheck" performance of Gigi Edgley? Guess again! That's right, it was the totally unexpected presence of a mint '67 Rambler Rebel SST convertible right in the middle of the picture! "My God!" I shouted, frightening the dog and making Dave jump in his chair, "I have found a redeeming feature in this movie!" I actually watched the thing all the way to the end based on this fact, and I still could not tell you what the hell happened.
Idiotic
posted on 13 Feb 2009Alright... This movie has good special effects. Its fights are good. The acting is decent. That's about it. The story is thin, (something about aliens harvesting pollutants from Earth; to collect them they are going to blow us up. Why not just ask us? "They don't negotiate". Duh. Why have a renewable resource when you can be macho and blow stuff up?)the plot twists are about as exciting as watching grass grow, and the inaccuracies (pointed out in other comments) are glaring and decrease any sense of "it-could-happen-someday" suspense garnered from well-done movies like Aliens. I honestly don't care if it is a good "Saturday night film" (i.e., mindless violence). Why would I waste my life on it? Get this film if you are sick, extremely bored, you have no money or books, and your music player has no battery.
It doesn't even have much humor
posted on 12 Jan 2009This movie was bad within the first 5 minutes. It only takes minimal research to find out some basic info about Area 51. 1. It's on a dry lake bed in the Nevada Desert. Not a whole lot of lush green vegetation in the countryside there. 2. It's an actual military installation, not a disguised park. The people at Area 51 are military and in uniform, again no disguises are necessary. So think of a dry fenced in airbase with soldiers. Not a National Park with Rangers. Anyone in uniform has his hair trimmed short and neat. Just putting on a uniform won't fool anyone closer than 50 ft. That was what I noticed in the first 5 minutes. It went downhill from there when I found out that most of the cast can't act and the plot was thin. This doesn't even belong in the Bargain Bin, If anyone makes a DVD of this it's worth more as a coaster.
I thoroughly enjoyed this film
posted on 09 Nov 2008I'll tell you why. It wasn't the best film in the world, and it certainly wasn't the worst. But what it was not, well, it was not BORING!!! And for me, to sit through a two hour TV movie, well, I just sat and watched and enjoyed. The special effects were very well done. I didn't watch it for the acting. I watched it because I enjoy sci-fi and with all the crap out here and yes, most of the crap is on the SCi-fi Channel, with their reptiles, and snakes and whatever, it was nice to just enjoy an Alien movie without having to think about it too much.So if you just want to chill in front of the TV, grab some popcorn, grab your wife or girlfriend and sit and enjoy a not too complicated sci-fi movie.I'm so tired of zombies, vampires etc. We need a sequel to this one. Well done Sci Fi Channel.
About average for the SF channel
posted on 22 Oct 2008Let's start with the things that are patently idiotic. Area 51 isn't in the desert as we have all been told, it's actually in a national park near St. Louis! Apparently that whole desert thing is just Government misdirection. Damn clever! Can you say "tax break for setting your film in our crappy backyard"? Apparently, a group of bad Aliens, the "Cronen" are waiting for us to generate enough pollution to meet their needs when they they will swoop in, kill us all and swipe our toxic waste. When the requisite female scientist asked the obvious question "Why kill us, we'd be glad to give them all they want for free" the only answer is "They don't negotiate". What are they, the Bush Administration? Not to mention the obvious fact that if they kill us all our ability to generate more pollution is zero, whereas if they just hauled it all away we'd make more than ever (just imagine if the EPA removed all restrictions, we would be a toxic goldmine). This is kind of like harvesting apples by cutting down the trees with a chainsaw and burning the stumps. And what kind of civilization doesn't know how to create pollution? The Bizarro world? "Me make car runs on smog and makes clean air. Me sad." Anyway, the plot revolves around a good alien sent here by someone to try to stop them by shutting down the "Omega Seed", which is the alien sensor that determines when the pollution level is adequate for harvesting. Turns out it's buried under a futuristic manhole cover in a barn. Makes you wonder what the farmer thought it was. "Dang it Clem, I done told ya not to park the tractor on the Omega Seed". The acting is semi-adequate, with the standout being Gigi Edgely, much missed since Farscape got axed ( a show superior in every conceivable way). Watching her try, and occasionally fail, to hide her Aussie accent is enchanting. The SFX and fight scenes are OK. All in all, better than most SF movies, which makes it just sub-par for anyone else.
Disappointing
posted on 24 Sep 2008This was quite disappointing. I had higher hopes for this movie, although i'm not sure why. The movie started decently enough but soon became worse + worse until it was just hard to watch for how bad it was. The movie doesn't even take place in Area 51. The story (or lack there of) is incoherent and the acting is hardly any better. A few of the actors deliver alright but the dialogue + story just isn't there. Very little about the "plot" really makes sense in the film + it seems the writers were making it up as they go. The directing/camera work on the film is also quite shotty. O well, this is what i get for trusting the Sci-Fi channel.
Pretty Good Movie
posted on 29 Aug 2008I enjoyed it. Don't know why some people are complaining - interesting aliens, a fast-paced story, plot twists. Acting wasn't too bad either. And for once, the hero wasn't like a regular guy who all of a sudden becomes superman squared. One could relate to or at least understand the characters, even the 'dumb' ones!! Aliens had their vulnerabilities too. Adding Area 51 added a neat plot depth. I would like to see sequel. Compared to a whole lot of stuff I have seen on Sci-Fi (including one they send a demolition man to repair the moon-HA!) this was a well-written, well-acted movie that held my attention. Where there weaknesses? Sure, but I wasn't expecting Oscar-quality. Not bad for a Saturday evening.
The battle to save Earth
posted on 22 Jul 2008It is hard to imagine that my attention would be directed away from Christa Campbell, but Farscape star Gigi Edgley managed to do just that. Campbell (Death by Engagement, Revamped) was very evident in the first part of the film, but Edgley took over and saved us from the evil aliens. Well, Jason London (Dazed and Confused) helped her a bit.It was the aliens that really stole the show. The good alien (unnamed on IMDb) was trying to stop the evil alien, with massive tricks up his sleeve, from destroying Earth to harvest our spent nuclear fuel. We would have gladly given it to them! The alien battles were very reminiscent of the Terminator.References to Area 51 and the crash at Roswell in 1947 made this more interesting for conspiracy fans.
Barely adequate film.
posted on 19 May 2008This film was okay, but not great. Apparently, it's original title was Alien vs. Alien, but it was released as "Showdown in Area 51".The plot is that two aliens land on Earth, one with the intention of allowing a weapon called the Omega Seed to wipe out all life on Earth so they can harvest our pollution. It really doesn't seem like much of a plan, as others have noted. (Love the Bizarro World comment!) The key to the weapon was lost on the spaceship that crashed in Roswell in 1947, but the real Area 51 is in Missouri guarded by the Forest Service. Yup, the Forest Service is the real Men in Black. Who knew? Okay, so you have slacker dude Jake who got kicked out, introduced by his brother who still works there, doing all the exposition before being vaporized by alien baddies. Slacker Jake teams up with the good alien and looks up his old girlfriend, Farscapes Gigi Edgely. I really wasn't a fan of her performance here. I think she was trying too hard to hide her Aussie accent, and for some reason her posture was bad for much of the film.So after some confusion as to which murdering alien they should trust, they manage to deactive the doomsday device. The aliens decide that they are going to retreat after that. Again, makes no sense whatsoever. If you have a whole invasion fleet, why would you only send down one guy to make sure your bomb goes off. Why not send down a whole team of these guys, and secure the thing? Why not just attack with your fleet and take out the inferior Earth forces? Still, it's better than average for a direct to DVD release.
A very 5 star "Who WRITES this stuff???"
posted on 12 Aug 2009I watched this because of the intriguing title, and a bit out of "Party of Five" sentiment. I've seen over 2500 films, yet none of the actor I had seen before, so I thought hey nice! unknown actors! But I was thoroughly disappointed by the story. And the cinematography.I just don't like that a film, which is supposed to have sweltering skies and a desert backdrop is played out under a leaden sky. All right, so I like the sun, sue me. Yeah yeah, I know they explained it, and they're Canadians, so can you blame them for using their own country? I guess not.Still, this movie had 2nd rate written all over it. There is nothing which annoys me so much as Stupid Characters. Prime Example: the Tough Sarge. Why was he so stupid as not to distinguish between the two aliens? and on the other hand, Our Hero could just as easily have said: Look, he's the local Interstellar Cop, that is an Intergalactic Hoodlum and he wants to kill us all for profit/food/our minerals. Easy explanation, but yeah that would kinda kill the story .... But wait! that is the mark of a good writer, that presents his lore in such a way that believable obstacles are given, which do not rely on the stupidity of the characters. Wouldn't Our Hero say everything that sounds reasonable to keep the world from being poisoned? It's bad, very bad. Then, they try to throw in a totally unbelievable plot twist near the end, which could explain the rapid progress of the villain to the scene of the Bomb, but TOTALLY unbelievable, since we get no background info on Bad Alien at all, whereas we do get background info on Good Alien, he has a GF, she died, etc etc. Minor detail: They used the same bike they used in Tinman!!! I mean, how cheap can a channel get!!84 mins of my life ... anyway, it's that I get somewhat paid to review these, or else ...