Alien Origin (2012)

Spoiler alert...although if you saw the trailer this alert is unnecessary as the trailer basically tells the story in whole, better than the movie.A lot of reviewers said there wasn't enough action, but I could live with that if the action that was there made any sense.First, you have a group of military men plus a journalist going heavily armed into the jungles of Belize to set up spy cameras to catch any possible illegal activity. For some reason, from the start they decide they need to sneak into the jungle with guns out, as though they're walking into the middle of a war zone. Having never been in a Belize jungle, I guess it's possible that makes sense...but it seems unlikely.Then, despite their paranoia, they go to sleep without posting someone to night watch duty, although they do set up some night vision cameras to record some animal visitors. In the morning some of the cameras are missing and the trees have weird slashes on them which causes some concern, but not much.The behavior of the actors...whether due to acting or direction, I have no idea, was either flat or unreal.They're told their mission has changed and they have to investigate the disappearance of some archaeologists.They find one of the missing archaeologists with some Mennonites and she leads them to what clearly looks to be an alien spaceship. Do they radio to their headquarters to let them know to send back up? Scientists to investigate? Does the journalist look happy to have found the scoop of a lifetime? Do they do anything at all? Nope; they just head on inside, barely reacting to the fact that they're in a freaking UFO. They only get concerned when they decide it's a "maze" in there and they may get lost.When the journalist picks up what looks like an alien skull with pointy teeth, an alarm goes off and they run screaming out of the ship. They finally radio in to their headquarters, but do they mention the UFO? Nope; they ask for extraction...and are told to walk several miles to a road to meet some trucks. When they get to said trucks, they are empty and don't start. Do they radio in to let anyone know this; nope; they decide to walk to the next extraction point. Along the way they find the exact same cave that the archaeologist's found earlier. They're desperately running from aliens and looking for extraction so of course they ditch that plan and decide to investigate the cave.I stopped watching at that point. It wasn't the horrible graphics. It wasn't the bad acting. I just couldn't hold on to my "suspension of disbelief". I couldn't believe trained military personal would behave so stupidly. Because of that, I was rooting for the alien by then. I already knew from the beginning that these people would disappear. I not only didn't care anymore if they did; I couldn't wait for it to happen.

****Contains spoilers**** Despite all the bad reviews, as a fan of sci-fi i decided to watch this movie. I have to give credit to the bad comments in several aspects, not seeing anything but 1.5 seconds of the right leg of the alien's mechanoid was a bit frustrating, the lack of amusement of the crew when they've met the alien ship too, in fact the lack of military behavior in most of the film but very specially in that part is almost unbearable. Speaking of military stuff... even if it is a civilian reporter going on a routine patrol, every and all members of the party ALWAYS wear military uniforms, not a bright yellow jacket in middle of the jungle, but i want that jacket, it never got dirt! :-D The movie has several funny situations for those willing to see them, like that one previously stated. One that took a laugh off me, maybe because i've spent almost 30 years of my life as photographer, was to see the guy recording the soldier with a 400mm lens while being less than 2 meters away LOL But! The movie has a nice way to generate tension and one is many times waiting to see what will happen next, sadly in most cases it is left to the viewer's imagination, as the film wont show it.I think, or i want to think, that this movie was made on a notoriously low budget, if so it is quite remarkably well done, the footage scenes has more proximity with what real combat footage is than many would recognize. Camera shaking is all around, as many stated before myself, but that is part of real footage, unless you use a well-known-brand of action sports video cameras the shaking will be there and there is close to nothing to be done about it, changes in exposure due to uncontrolled environment are well represented in the movie as well Now, if there would be any part of the movie i could cut-off that would be the epilogue. Firstly it wasn't really necessary to explain anything, secondly it would have saved the film from it's biggest mistake: No one can do a DNA analysis in middle of the jungle, without a sophisticated lab and in such short time! lol OK, now that I'm done writing this, i want to watch the movie again. If not anything, i think it is quite inspiring for many to try and roll their own movie on this style, quite few will succeed and earn a lot of satisfaction, but i guess most will earn a new respect for this movie after failing at it.

I am a huge fan of bad movies, and over the years I've enjoyed some real stinkers... but this ain't one of them. Even using the word "boring" to describe it does an injustice to the definition. The camera work makes me wonder if the cameraman was an intern. The storyline is preposterous and there is never any suspension of disbelief. I fell asleep about midway through but forced myself to go back and watch the parts I missed just to be sure it didn't redeem itself. It never did. It's the entertainment equivalent of Novocaine. While I also didn't care for Blair Witch, that movie was at least original and mildly entertaining. The only thing this movie has going for it is Belize. In fact, if you mute the sound, some of the film looks rather like a travelogue. If they'd stuck with that idea, they might have had something.

Alien Origin is the love child of Predator and The Blair Witch Project. And let me tell you, folks, the offspring is not pretty. In fact, it's down right ugly.In the tradition of such films as Quarentined and The Blair Witch Project, the movie documents the mission of a group of soldiers who head off into the jungle and are never heard from, again. Of course, a camera with video documenting the events of the fateful mission, (thanks to the fact that the troops were being accompanied by a cute, female reporter and her trusty cameramen)is recovered some months later, and this supposedly the "actual footage" of what REALLY HAPPENED! And what wonderful video footage we have!!! At least a good hour of almost nothing but the soldiers marching through a rain forest in search of.... well, something. We're never really sure what the original mission is to begin with. The reporter tells us something, but she's quite vague. And the inane babble between her and the troops doesn't give much in the way of details on this matter. We do know that this eventually becomes a search party for two missing scientists who found something of interest and then disappeared themselves.But aside from those few points, we know NOTHING about this mission... except that it takes place in the jungle..... and that these people spend a LOT of time walking around in it.As the name implies, the troops and their media comrades eventually encounter aliens. Or, at least that's what we think they are. They do end up encountering a space ship, and they end up fighting... something. Is it an alien? Is it Bigfoot's cousin? Is it an angry fireworks salesman? Nobody can be sure, because the camera work becomes extremely jumpy and of poor quality. And we never get a look at what the threat really is, because the cameraman (who, if he was really in the media, would probably WANT to get at least a quick shot of an extra-terrestrial, because that would get him an instant bonus from his bosses when he got back home) is always shooting the reactions of the soldiers and his reporter-girl instead of whatever the hell it is they're fighting.This movie is bad so many ways that it almost isn't worth listing them all. The special effects are so low-budget, it's easy to tell that all of the explosions and rockets being fired are nothing more than fireworks left over from the Fourth of July (no, I am not exaggerating). The plot is almost non-existent. There is hardly any acting involved. The journey through the jungle is mind-numbingly long and dull, and the action scenes don't really provide any action; just confusion as to why they're happening and what's happening in them due to the poor camera-work and terrible jump-around editing.Don't bother with this movie.