Evil Aliens

As ‘Mysterious Skin’ showed last year, the tropes of ’90s-style alien-abduction mythology can still be put to good use. This tongue-in-cheek, no-budget splatterfest, however, feels like too little too late – too little suspense or wit, at least, as it has no shortage of crass stereotypes, bodily fluids or triple-breasted interstellar stunnas. The off-the-peg plot dispatches the cynical crew of tawdry satellite show ‘Weird Worlde’, plus a geeky alien enthusiast, to a remote Welsh island where a member of the sole, inbred family claims to have been impregnated by ETs. Ley lines and crop circles get a mention, but the focus is on vigorous anal probes and cattle mutilation undertaken by invaders who make vintage ‘Dr Who’ monsters seem like the height of prosthetic sophistication. Such crudeness nixes any chance of genuine menace, or even the gleeful spite of the marauders in ‘Mars Attacks!’. Barring a couple of nice nods to Jerry Springer and, er, The Wurzels, script, performances and direction are resolutely banal and exploitative, relying on a splash of cum here, a crucified crow there.