Aliens: Zone of Silence |
USA • 2017 • 79m •
   • Directed by: Andy Fowler. • Starring: Sarah Hester, Peter Gesswein, Jed Maheu, Vince Tula, Marcos Cline-Márquez, Werdna Relwof, Henry Baring-Fowler, Dane Perkins..   Four months ago, Morgan Taylor's brother, Hal, and his best friend went missing in a mysterious area of the Mexican desert known as Zona del Silencio. After receiving no help from authorities on either side of the border, Morgan heads south to uncover the truth about their disappearance, strapped with action cameras streaming footage to Hal's Marine Corps squadmate back in the United States. When her vehicle suddenly breaks down just outside the zone, Morgan must traverse the desert alone, enduring intense heat in the daytime and menacing coyotes at night. She eventually locates Hal's campsite and finds a kit filled with memory cards from his camera. The recordings reveal a series of strange noises, eerie lights in the sky, gravitational anomalies, and an extraterrestrial presence in a nearby mountain range. Convinced aliens were responsible for her brother's disappearance, Morgan must decide whether to flee with her life or attempt to expose the otherworldly beings once and for all.
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Review:
First and foremost, these self-filmed style movies can be amazing. This one was far from it. The continuity made absolutely zero sense. Scenes went from practically hyperventilating on camera to completely calm and collected conversations with absolutely zero buildup, or cooldown period at all. There was no rhyme or reason to the hysteria or lack thereof. I can't imagine anyone in a similar situation behaving like this at all. The characters would also freak the absolute hell out over something that wouldn't warrant a second thought in the real world. The directors of this movie must moonlight filming violent porn, because they are REALLY good at forcing scenes. All of this however was honestly a minor flaw in comparison to the rest. While on the topic of styles though, the film interference effects were too much. There's much better, and more subtle ways to simulate video streaming interference that would be far more effective and less irritating to watch. We get it, it's the zone of silence. Cool it with the effects.
The intended audience was a far bigger issue because as far as I can tell, this was a movie which intended to be for sci-fi fans, but the director was so disconnected from his audience he ended up making a movie for film students. Let's start with the most obvious problem: The entire damn plot. No, there will be no prisoners taken in this review. So old girl's brother, and friend go missing in the Mexican desert in a location that is known for really weird crap happening, alright, so far so good. The Mexican government doesn't care. Alright, sounds realistic so far. So what is the plan?
A) Form a private search party with several friends and relatives, and search the last known location of your brother in hopes of finding clues that may provide answers to his disappearance? B) As a single female, take 800 cameras it out into the middle of the desert, alone, where weird crap is known to happen and people go missing, AND where two able bodied men you know personally have gone missing? I'm sure it'll be okay, it's being streamed on the internet. Internet man will save the day if something happens!
If you answered B, then you may just be a delusional film student or director who needs to go camping or do something that doesn't involve making videos every now and then, because no one in their right mind would choose option B. Option B however is exactly what this movie was, and it was a very poor choice indeed. Not only is the entire underlying plot unrealistic, but it seems like absolutely nothing within said terrible plot added up, made sense, or even resembled something that might actually happen... Anywhere... Ever. Exhibit A) The plan once the main character gets to her destination. She sets up extremely advanced camera equipment, laser motion detection, and very triumphantly states "If anything moves, I'll know!" Yeah that's great... Then what? You're in a tent, in the middle of Mexico, and your only contact with the outside world is some voyer we can't QUITE tell if you hired or is a friend. All the camera equipment in the world won't save you from that crap sandwich. This of course ties back into the theory of the film being for film students, because only a film student would think that's somehow an advantageous situation.
Without describing the entire movie in detail, some other points do need to be addressed. This section will gloss over them. That's not how metal detection works directors. Try learning the basics about the things you're going to put in your movies. In that same vein, that's not how camping works, you hear weird stuff all the time, and funny enough, about 90% of it is animal mating calls. Not every sound heard deserves a hyperventilation scene. That's also not how missing persons cases work, even in Mexico. For the love of god and all that is holy, no one, and I mean no one would go into a place known for weird stuff and missing people in Mexico alone and unnamed. It just wouldn't happen. The Blaire Witch project is dead, just leave it alone and let it rest in peace, please.
This movie, right here, is literally the reason people pirate media. When steaming piles of film student crap are passed off as movies, and you believe you deserve money for it, you're creating a market for piracy. Nobody should have yo spend their hard earned money on a botch job like this. If this were a chicken dinner at a restaurant, I would send it back for being cold and raw. If this were a car repair, I would redeem the warranty on it. If this were a defective electronic, I would return it.
Review by komissar-93513 from the Internet Movie Database.
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