I remember back in the early eighties when director Michael
Laughlin was the talk of the town in numerous horror and science fiction fan
magazines. Everyone was raving about the one two punch of two of his films,
first STRANGE BEHAVIOR and then STRANGE INVADERS. Then in 1985 he made the
little seen film MESMERIZED and suddenly disappeared never directing a movie
again. As to why, who knows? But he left behind these few films as well as a
few others he produced that can still be enjoyed. Twilight Time has chosen this
film to release and done as good a job as possible with the film.
The movie is a tribute to the classic alien invasion films
of the 50s where the paranoia would run rampant and everyone was trying to make
sure they were not eliminated by the aliens sent here to take over. While a
tribute to those films it twist some of the standard conventions used in them
to make a slightly different sort of movie.
Paul Le Mat stars as Charles Bigelow, a professor of
entomology (the study of insects) at a university in New York. Divorced from
his wife Margaret (Diana Scarwid), his young daughter comes to spend some time
with him. But his wife doesn’t return to pick up the child and when calling to
find her he discovers she has completely disappeared. Unsure of what to do, he
packs up his dog leaves his daughter with his mother and heads to the small
Midwest town of Centerville where Margaret grew up.
When Charles arrives in town it appears like an idyllic
location but he finds few people wandering around. He checks into the local
hotel and asks about his wife’s family. The owner tells him he’s lived there
all his life and never heard of Margaret or the family. As Charles begins
searching for Margaret the locals seem less and less friendly, his dog
disappears and he finds himself racing out of town being pursued by a group
that have fired what seem like lasers at him.
Returning home he continues to worry about his ex-wife.
Looking at the news stand he sees a picture of a bug eyed alien on the cover of
a tabloid and recognizes it as one of the things that was pursuing him when he
headed out of town. He contacts the writer of the piece Betty Walker (Nancy
Allen) and asks about the picture, telling her his story. While she first
doesn’t believe him she changes her tune when the townspeople show up in New
York and try to abduct his daughter.
They succeed in capturing the girl and Charles heads back to
Centerville with the hopes of finding her and Margaret. With Betty along for
the ride all will be revealed before the final reel. But will that be in time
to save not just his daughter but Charles and his friend’s lives as well?
The movie does a great job of catching not just the feel of
those classic B movie science fiction films it is written in that style as well
and performances are less Oscar worthy and more Comic-con quality. Before you
get angry, that’s a compliment. The film even uses minimalist sets, costumes
and locations to give it the feeling of those old films. And it works.
As is always the case, Twilight Time has offered the best
reproduction of the film. That being said it has a hazy quality to it that
blu-ray or any format will never fix but that’s on purpose. Other extras
include an isolated score track, an audio commentary with director Michael
Laughlin and writer William Condon and the original theatrical trailer.
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