Silent Warnings (2003)

Silent Warnings starts at 'Brightwood College' where Layne Vossimer (A.J. Buckley) meets with with his girlfriend Macy (Callie De Fabry) & their friends Stephen (David O'Donell) his girlfriend Katrina (Michelle Borth) along with Maurice (Randford Doherty) & Iris (Kim Onasch) who are all going to drive out to the farm Layne has inherited after his cousin Joe (Stephen Baldwin) was killed in an accident. They intend to 'do' the place up & Layne plans to sell it off, simple eh? Well not really because the six friends hadn't counted on the alien beings who are using crop circles in the corns fields surrounding the farm as a means of teleportation...Co-written & directed by Christian McIntire while I didn't think Silent Warnings was brilliant or even approaching it I thought it was an OK watch. The script by McIntire & Bill Lundy is all build up & scene setting for the first hour & then it changes direction completely & turns into an all out alien invasion film which is a shift in direction that felt like it came out of nowhere. The first hour tries to keep you in the dark a much as possible as nothing for definite is revealed but the presence of alien life-forms is obviously hinted at, it has a go at trying to explain the significance of the strange phenomena of crop circles which it does reasonably enough but when all said & done you just can't help but feel that Silent Warnings is a cheap Signs (2002) rip-off & considering the two were made & released so close together it's hard to put up a defence against it. There are just so many similarities for it to be a coincidence, however I suppose the good new is if you liked Signs & are after something very similar then Silent Warnings is definitely the film for you. It moves along at a reasonable pace although the first hour mainly relies on suggestion & careful build up, the character's are OK & not as annoying as many all teen cast films, the dialogue is alright & I actually found it quite watchable for what it was but then again why should you listen to me?Director McIntire does OK, this looks like a proper film & not the usual low grade stuff that goes straight-to-video & because of the cast that makes me believe this was maybe intended for a theatrical release. There are one or two half decent 'jump' scare moments although in the end they're cheap scares, there's a certain mysterious feel to the film during the first hour & it has it's moments. Now the bad news, the alien CGI computer effects are absolutely terrible, no question they are awful & the aliens inspire fits of laughter rather than screams. Oh well, nothings perfect I suppose.Techncially the films pretty good terrible CGI effects apart, it's well made throughout with decent enough production values. Apparently Silent Warnings was shot in Sofia in Bulgaria. The acting was alright & Billy Zane is still paying the price for appearing in The Phantom (1996) as all he can get is acting jobs in films like this shot in Bulgaria.Silent Warnings isn't the best film ever but I found it a harmless enough way to pass 80 odd minutes, you could do a lot better for sure but you could do a lot worse as well.

If I hadn't seen SIGNS i might have been impressed by the whole cornfield/alien angle. But its been done before and I was hoping this film would take a whole new angle. It doesn't. Billy Zane looks like he's on drugs. Some time is spent revealing who the characters are and how they relate to each other, there's an obligatory semi nude scene but its pointless - all the characters are shallow and uninteresting IMHO. Considering the technology these aliens must have there are holes in the plot large enough to drive a monster truck through. NEVER have I seen such woefully depicted monsters/aliens. I know this thing was made on a budget but if they couldn't use CGI properly then stick to rubber suits. Forget the comparisons to SIGNS - this one STINKS!

Of course, it was obvious that it was a rip-off of Signs, but I didn't quite know what to make of Signs, so I thought this might provide a more wholesome movie experience. It started out well. After the main character's cousin mysteriously dies in a car crash, this guy and five college friends of his go to the cousin's house in a corn field near a small rural village. It's a good set-up, and there is a very nice and natural dynamic between all the characters, leading one to think that there might actually be a good story in here somewhere.Unfortunately, there isn't. The interesting character interactions, which you want to see developed, get cut short by some silly nonsense about anonymous grey aliens. The end is a meaningless fizzle, where you can't tell if the alien invasion is retreating or advancing.The movie starts out having a point, but ends up having none. 4 out of 10.

I understand scifi channel could not afford big CGI effects,but COME ON!This movie was horrible in every way possible.the acting was pathetic,the plot was just stupid, and worse off,the aliens didn't even look real. this movie is about a guys cousin,who has seen these weird crop circles on his farm before finding out WHAT is really going on, disappears.this guy, some friends of his, and the sheriff(played by billy zane)all set out to find out what these crop circles are all about.they soon uncover these findings in his cousins attic that there are aliens involved somehow.this movie is a total signs rip off(which is a great movie itself.)and the scifi channel could have done a much better job with it.if you want a good laugh then feel free to watch silent warnings otherwise stay away from this movie if you can.