Oct 111988
 
one reel

Three years after the landing of an alien spacecraft, the “Newcomers” have begun to integrate into American society, much like immigrants before them.  After his partner is killed during a shootout with Newcomers in “Slag Town,” an alien ghetto, Detective Sykes (James Caan) requests Sam Francisco (Mandy Patinkin), the first alien to be made a police detective, as his new partner, thinking this might help him track the killers.

For a few moments, it appears that there will be something interesting in Alien Nation, something we haven’t seen a hundred times before.  Science fiction is at its best when it looks at humanity and human society through metaphor, and Alien Nation sets up a great bit of social introspection. The Newcomers represent immigrants to the U.S. They are proud and want to keep part of their ethnic heritage, but they also want the American dream and freedom. They are hated by many, feared by more, and held in contempt by almost everyone. Workers fear losing their jobs to these foreigners, no one understands their customs, and racial tensions are high.  That’s good stuff. And after ten minutes, it’s all gone. In its place we’re given a buddy cop movie with every cliché.

If you watch even a few movies a year, you’ve already seen this one, just with different actors and makeup. Hey, one of the cops is a hardass and the other plays by the rules. Wow. And the hardass is a lonely divorced slob.  Gee, has that been done before?  They have different backgrounds, which opens up lots of oh-so-funny scenes where one is aghast at the other’s choice in lunch. Hmmmm. I wonder if by the end they will have developed an appreciation for each other? If that isn’t bad enough, they are actually chasing a drug dealer who has significant social standing. Did anyone bother writing this or did they just steal the script from any of a few dozen ’80s buddy films, and then switch the term “black” or “liberal” or “new-ager” or “near-retiree” with “Newcomer”?

The science fiction aspect is light, approaching non-existent. The idea should be to make aliens appear alien enough so that we can view them without preconceived notions, but these extraterrestrials are less foreign then half of the people I know.  Physically, they are humans with spotted, bald heads (OK, I don’t know that many people with spotted heads…not that many…). Odd that they were genetically engendered by other aliens to look like us.  It is a very small universe indeed. They also like to drink sour milk (gosh, isn’t that funny?); that’s about as unusual as it gets.

Patinkin does a respectable, if unexciting job as the stereotypical new cop (with a spotted head), but Caan never works out if this is supposed to be serious or comedic. He tends toward the overacting, broad approach more often than the true-life dramatic one, but really settles for phoning in his performance. I can’t blame him.

With no humor, car chases as action, and nothing to say, Alien Nation is a waste of time better spent speculating on why your socks don’t all match.

It was followed by a short-lived TV series and six made-for-T.V. movies: Alien Nation (1989), Alien Nation: Dark Horizon (1994), Alien Nation: Body and Soul (1995), Alien Nation: Millennium (1996), Alien Nation: The Enemy Within (1996), Alien Nation: The Udara Legacy (1997).

 Aliens, Reviews Tagged with: