Written by Mr. Mouseburger 25th Jun 2007
Writeup loosely sketched by Jack
M. Night Shyamalan delivers another completely unfrightening festival of ludicrousness with his alien flick, Signs. The alien invasion force must have been kicking themselves that being so sensitive to something as innocuous as water, they have decided to invade a planet on which water covers 7/10ths of the surface. OK, this is plausible enough I suppose, but you would think that the alien Generals would have given their invasion force suitable protection against this water. Not so, they prove to be less well equiped than the British army!
Still, after some moderately eerie events (like dogs barking at nothing in the field, shadows under door frames and door knobs turning etc.) we approach the end of the film where we at last see an Alien. It really is disappointing, and looks like Posh Spice wearing sunglasses. The alien holds the young son hostage in the house for some reason - possibly to force the family to "take me to your leader" - which is inexplicable, as it is clear that this bunch of hicks have no idea who their leader is, let alone know where he lives.
Still, this action does give Merrill Hess the chance to show off his baseball skills by pummelling seven shades of alien crap out of the intruder before grabbing his brother and fleeing to safety. The poor alien's misfortune is compounded by a glass of water tumbling on his head. This most probably killed him, although we don't see the death.
This is still in draft form, and it's not even a very good one.
A good review would point out this death is completely ridiculous. Defeated by water? What the hell are they going to do when it rains?
Just bumping because this write-up has been officially added and significantly improved upon. And made me burst out loud laughing. Repeatedly.
Bit of spelling glitch, mind - "problably".
Signs isn't that bad. I pretty much enjoyed it. By the way, wouldn't offscreen killing count? Oh, and the alien was holding Morgan hostage so they wouyldn't try to kill him, which didn't work.
Monk, don't be too offended, that is just my prose style. But if, as you point out, the alien did not want them to kill him, then why the hell did it bother to sustain the family to moderately terrifying events in their house? why not just leave them in peace in the first place?
With regards to the category omission - you are right, it should be off-screen killing, and has been amended accordingly. Thanks for spotting that one!
Personally I figured this alien was taking revenge because not only were his people getting their asses kicked, but this is the same alien that Mel Gibson's character cut the fingers off of earlier in self defense.
I finally saw this movie about a month ago when it aired on TV, and I have to admit I was dissapointed and confused. Why did the wife, who died in a car accident some time before the aliens showed up, know that the aliens were going to show up, threaten her son in thier living room, and that water and a baseball bat would kill it? I could have missed the explanation, I did start to tune this movie out but it didn't seem like it gave a good explanation.
I thought this movie was decent. Not good, not bad but for what it is, it's good.
I think that the Alien's archetype should be changed to Creature because they never really do elaborate whether or not it is evil. One thing that I noticed while re watching it was that it gave the boy a gas when he was having an asthmatic attack and the boy later on survives. It was left ambiguous as to whether or not the aliens were evil or wanted peace so whether that gas was a cure or poison is unknown therefore qualifying it for a Creature rating.
Also, yes, the water weakness was retarded.