Director: Matthew A. Peters
Year: 2023
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Creature Feature
Plot:
Heading out into the woods, a man hoping to use the trip to propose to his girlfriend finds his attempts at doing so hampered by the rest of the family’s dislike of him, and when he tries to make everything right is again foiled by an interstellar alien species body-hopping between hosts trying to take over the world.
Review:
This was a pretty enjoyable effort. One of the finer aspects of this one is the rather solid and impressive setup that provides the film with quite a lot to really like. Featuring a lot of great work around here with the starting introduction of the family and the issues that go on there involving how no one in her family really likes him while they spend far more time and attention on the sisters’ boyfriend instead, this creates a wholly enjoyable series of interactions between them where his attempts at trying to be nice fall flat with the parents who have no interest in anything he does. This comedic effort goes alongside the burgeoning alien invasion storyline quite nicely as the family activities that split everyone up so they don’t notice the alien running around in the woods integrating the stragglers and others who are out in the area serves the film incredibly well.
This lets the films’ alien scenes come off rather nicely with the body-hopping being able to feature some rather likable aspects here. The whole idea of it taking over the bodies of others in the woods where they overwhelm them with the goo to turn into the newly infected hosts to then infiltrate the rest of the family with their mission to wipe out humanity and force the remaining members of the family to deal with them using the help of the agent who knows the truth to finally stop them is all quite enjoyable here and has some fun aspects throughout here. With the big point of these body-snatching and immersion tactics leading into the frantic finale where they manage to start their transfer process with the uninfected members of the family using the tools at their disposal to stop the overpowering force in front of them, it also provides some cheesy and fun gore and effects to give the film a lot to like about it.
There are not too many flaws here but it does have some minor issues. The main drawback of the film is the overlong build-up to the aliens’ overtaking the family and integrating into their trip that it doesn’t spend a whole lot of the first half really delving into their purpose and origins. It spends more time on the luck-luss boyfriend trying to get into the family’s good graces and screwing up royally that it doesn’t do a whole lot of the invasion aspects until the finale where it gets a lot more traction with an info-dump about the mission and how to deal with them as it rushes through a lot of the confrontations here in short order as a result. There’s also the film’s low-budget which is a bit obvious throughout here which comes about quite obviously, from the lack of locations, presentation, and low-quality gore that gets featured here which might not be that much of an issue but also shows up throughout here.
Overview: ****/5
A highly enjoyable indie creature feature, this one comes off far better than expected with quite a lot to like about it and not too many drawbacks to do so which end up making everything here quite fun. Those who appreciate this kind of indie genre feature or are curious about it will have a lot to like here while those who are turned off by this kind of effort should heed caution here.
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