1985 science fiction movie
Rating: 3/20 (Josh: 1/20; Fred: 11/20; Libby: 14/20; Jeremy: no rating)
Plot: An alien fireballs to earth for reasons that are never fully explained, and some rednecks decide they can profit from it. Meanwhile, an archaeologist and his former student try to save it while also maybe saving the hillbillies from themselves. And I just put more thought into this plot synopsis than the screenwriters put into this movie's screenplay.
There were certainly a lot of Dohlers involved in the making of Galaxy Invader. Ok, so there's really only four of them including writer/director Don Dohler, but that still--obviously from the results--exceeded Hollywood's Dohler limit. It probably exceeded it by tfour actually. One of the Dohlers, Pam Dohler, plays "People at Table" which seems like a pretty neat trick. I looked the Dohlers up, and they've all three been in other movies which were either all directed by the same Don Dohler or, in some wild coincidence, a guy with an identical name. Actually, I'd forgotten the name Don Dohler, but I really enjoyed another one of his movies a while back--Nightbeast. That's memorable for a great performance and scintillating sex scene featuring a guy named Tom Griffith. This movie's got its own fantastically awful performance by a a guy named Richard Ruxton who runs around wearing about half a t-shirt and yelling like a demented low-budget Jimmy Stewart. No, there's not a sex scene, but he does attempt to rape somebody at a time that doesn't make a great deal of sense. Watching Ruxton's performance, you really can't tell if he's got an authentic accent or not. In fact, you might have trouble even figuring out if he's an actual human being. It's the kind of performance that seems like a miracle, and I'm serious, Jimmy Stewart Fan Club--you need to check this movie out and pretend it's a long-lost performance from the Hollywood icon. There are loads of colorful characters, none of them with dialogue that makes much sense (most of the lines, I believe, are repetitious mentions of "the green man" or lines about money) or with cigars that stay the size they're supposed to. That cigar belonged to another fine character played by Don Leifert who also shone in Nightbeast. An action figure of that guy would have to come with cigar and beer can accessories. Bad movies get magical when it seems like it was written by a person who has never actually seen human beings interact, and this movie could have been written by the titular galaxy invader who, by the way, just kind of stumbles around with no clear intentions and doesn't look capable of even finding himself a galaxy. Here's the galaxy invader:
The green man! He's played by Glenn Barnes who was also in Nightbeast and--this is going to shock you--is the half-brother of Don Dohler. I'm surprised Barnes wasn't invited to play a monster in any other movies because his pigeon-toed trot looks just like an alien's should. This movie feels made-up-as-the-Dohlers-go, the characters never feel like real people, and the pacing feels awkward. But it all leads to a climax that will leave you stunned an unable to sleep for days (Hint: It features a dummy!), so it's all worth the time invested. A fun bad movie.
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