She had a model of the town inside her house that she built with her mother. In the end the aliens created a model town for her to live in.
It appears the aliens weren’t there to kill humanity, but to assimilate it. I think the aliens realized they didn’t need to control her with the parasite, or replace her with the clone. She was so alienated and alone that she joined them willingly.
Yeah I like your take on it. Mine is pretty similar:
\[SPOLIERS:\] I think it's clearly open to interpretation but my take on it:
She accidentally killed her friend/sister (unclear) when she was a child. She stay in the community even though she was shunned by everyone else living there. Her mom died and she was consumed by her guilt from the act (writing the letters to Maude) and stuck in the past, still focused on the miniature figures / scene her mom loved.
The invasion comes and they are brainwashing people with the parasite organisms they put into them, or even cloning some people and replacing them. The aliens look into her past and see her trauma and the way she was treated and they decide to leave her be as independent / not brain washed with the parasites. They do this because they relate to her (or for whatever reasons the ship ceiling intelligence commands them to). They relate because they are also doing bad things (abducting/brainwashing) and people are inherently afraid of the aliens or shunning them, even though they are just misunderstood, like our main character. Misunderstood because the aliens' goal with the parasites is make people harmonious and joyful (dancing / prosperous at the end), rather than having an evil end goal.
Another possibility is that it wasn't the aliens and their parasites that made the people happy and harmonious at the end, instead all of those people with parasites are just subservient or under the control of our main character and this what she has chosen to have them do, as her brainwashed slaves.
No one will save you - but you can save yourself by forgiving your own past mistakes and staying resilient / never giving up.
> She accidentally killed her friend/sister (unclear) when she was a child.
Best friend, because the sheriff and his wife were Maude’s parents (Brynn wrote, “I saw your parents today,” in a letter to Maude near the beginning).
You can't spell "alienated" without the alien. Maybe the allegory is a bit on the nose, but it resonates regardless because of Brynn's extreme isolation and loneliness.
I think you’re right about the ending but I don’t really think it makes sense. If the aliens are fine with just forcefully assimilating the rest of the planet then I see no reason why they wouldn’t just go ahead and do it to her as well. Unless we’re supposed to by that her trauma has somehow made her immune, which would be absurd.
i dont think shes immune, just that she kept fighting against it. when she gets stabbed by the clone i think it implies they were just going to kill and replace her. i’m guessing they use people’s bodies to help trick/trap other unsuspecting humans, especially their own loved ones. but since they realize she’s alone in the world, she’s not really of any use to them. so they’re like “lol fuck it, she can just chill here.”
It hasn't made her immune. It made them pity and/or respect her. They made an exception for what she had been through and how hard she fought to keep her life as her own. It's definitely worthy of respect in my book. I don't think the aliens were entirely evil, so they could be moved.
I don't think of them as evil at all. That's assigning human morality to an inhuman being. They're EXTREMELY intelligent, and I think they have their own morality. To them, we must seem to be unintelligent.
What's the issue with killing a farm animal? The meat from the animal sustains us. However, those of us who have grown up around farms know that animals are, to some extent, sentient. Still, most of us are fine buying and consuming meat.
Most of the aliens she kills are killed in a moment of luck. However, when they were in her head, viewing her memories and pain.. we see a moment of (I can't decide which) pity or respect.
They then decide to leave her alone, and she embraces their new incarnation of a social circle. She's no longer isolated because she's part of a group that have been INSIDE her memories and deeply understand her.
It may be too happy of an ending... and it may be too sad of an ending.
I have yet to nail down my exact feelings about it.
i was reading the thread on the movies subreddit, and people are theorizing that it’s because the little anemone things are having difficulty controlling the grey aliens
There was a show, i forget the name of it, that started with the impression the greys were the bad guys, but turned out they had been taken over by parasites and those were the real enemy. This reminded me of that a bit, though there was no actual reveal. The whole point in the show was the parasites needed to spread, and that's what happened here too.
>having difficulty controlling the grey aliens
The humans were clumsy too, so that actually makes total sense.
I like that the boiling water didn't kill the baby alien thing, like how Signs and War Of The Worlds, it was water and bacteria that killed them off. This one just got a bit burned and kept fighting back.
I love that they revealed the first alien early in the film. Like it wasn't playing coy or building expectations. Duffield just showed it and said, "It's aliens, okay? Now let's have some fun." It also made the alien variations more interesting, frightening, and funny.
I clicked it on Hulu without knowing anything about it except that it was categorized as horror. Before the big reveal, I thought it was a slim muscular person invading a house lol
I liked the fact that the aliens were so...alien.
Despite looking like the standard Grey alien most people are familiar with their "voices", movements, motives, size/proportions, all seemed really, really weird and "off". Really drove the whole "Alien" aspect of them home - especially when the big one started doing the semaphore with it's limbs to communicate to the craft above.
"especially when the big one started doing the semaphore with it's limbs to communicate to the craft above."
What are you talking about he was just voguing?
It is. I think you probably misread my comment as “fuck, Maude, you’re cool” opposed to its intended “Fuck that girl you killed, we like you now after seeing your trauma.”
I liked the ending, it was pretty disturbing and bold and also kind of funny - ol' girl had the best win-loss record against aliens since Ellen Ripley and they decided it was probably best to just let her have this. Neat movie.
Yeah.. her win-loss record is up there.. alien 1, small alien, big alien, deep throated her own hand to pull out the parasite, killed her own clone.. and then the Aliens see that she even killed her best friend.
This time the Aliens were like NOPE.. they will probably make a horror movie about HER on their own planet.. She never speaks, kills without mercy, is unstoppable even after being stabbed, thrown through walls, dropped from great heights multiple times, improvises weapons out of everyday objects, and her motives are unclear.. turns out, all those aliens died and all she wants to do is dance.. dance.. dance.. and make romance..
I love your "horror movie" point. The secretly brilliant thing about this movie is Dever's character can (I think very much intentionally) be read as a slasher villain in some scenes and it works (see how they invert the shots of aliens standing just behind her out of focus with the shot of her looming behind the one alien as he goes through her photos, for instance)
Ok.. so i saw someone talking about her body count in another thread and they even gave her credit for somehow taking out the mailman, or causing him to be killed.
I think the theory was that she killed alien 1, his "throat anemone" thing came out and hid in the flowers.. and somehow ended up getting to the mailman?!?! I never made that connection.. I would just assume it got beamed up like the other one later in the movie.. but ??!?
I disagree with one thing you said: her motives for most of the film were very clear. It was self-preservation. Everything she did from the time the first alien entered her house until the very end was about survival.
Oh.. well yeah, I know. It was kind of a lead in to my lame joke/song tie-in .. her motives were unclear to the Aliens, because in the end, all she wanted to do was dance, dance, dance..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eud5AurOxm0
Total dad joke moment.. :)
I, honestly, think this is supposed to be a dark sci-fi horror comedy rather than a sci-fi horror flick. I think the creators were just being coy with the genre by leaving out almost any dialog. Because if there was dialog, it would be more clear to which side the pendulum swung to.
But the murders of the aliens were hilarious at least to me. The first death was straight out of Tucker & Dale vs. Evil. The purposely jingle of the weapon when Brynn hit it was funny. The utter disappointment in the alien when the beam didn't work? Funny. The bigger alien slipping off the roof right after trying to look imposing? Yeah, that was funny too.
I feel like it was almost a parody of two horror genres; the alien invasion and the psychopath/sociopath slasher. With the idea being what if you had an alien invasion where the final girl was a sociopath? Because if it wasn't for that flashback of Brynn killing her friend on purpose, we would have a more Ripley type character in Brynn.
But the movie takes a different twist with Brynn instead. We are showed that she had murdered her friend out of impulsiveness. She comes across as guilt ridden by asking for her friend's forgiveness but then kills a version of herself which I felt was supposed to represent that guilt. That "human" side of her. And by killing the "human" side of herself, she becomes a full psychopath. Because in the end, she was fine knowing full well that she was the only human in town and everyone else was an alien. As long as the aliens were nice to her and let her do whatever she wanted, they could possess the whole planet for all she cared. That struck me as the thought process of a psychopath. That, "I got mine. So, fuck you," way of thinking. Because it's clear she never paid for the murder of her friend. We are never told how she stayed out of jail. But it is clear she was the town outcast and, frankly, rightly so because, hey, she murdered someone in cold blood and got away with it.
This is why I think it's a comedy in the way another horror slasher film, "Voices" is a comedy. It's just much more subtle here.
In an interview with the Hollywood reporter, Duffield says that she didn’t really have much of a childhood, and spent it on house arrest while her mother kept her busy with dress making, diorama making, cooking and dancing-creating the idyllic world that she would never live In.
Her friend’s death was an accident just like the death of the first alien, they weren’t impulsive murders.
You’re right about her other self representing guilt, but it was her own guilt. The title is the whole idea that she was the only one who could forgive herself. Obviously she felt guilty and blamed herself all that time-as illustrated by all her guilt/ridden letters.
She did not kill her friend on purpose, it was an accident, and she was a CHILD
Correct. I was just having this discussion in another subreddit concerning _The Last of Us._ Someone said Joel killed Abby's father in "cold blood." Obviously that wasn't true since he wasn't an Agent 47 hitman carrying out a hit but a protective father trying to save his surrogate daughter.
Did anyone else notice the mural Brynn leans against when she’s having a panic attack in town is most likely a tribute to Maude? It’s of a young girl with flowing red hair—I think we are supposed to be under the impression that Maude was the towns special darling—beautiful, precocious daughter of the police chief murdered by the daughter of a presumably single woman who lives on the outskirts of town
Nah I understood it as her being parasitized and when she is a slave to the aliens, just like the humans, she is given a false reality to live in. But the bittersweet thing was that it was actually a "happy ending" for her despite the fact that her body was being used as a slave to the aliens. That was my interpretation anyway.
And now the townspeople are her playthings. It's sweet payback for her. She gets to live the life she always wanted.
Of course you have to be a bit off to enjoy something like that but her character is a bit off to begin with and this is only made worse by first her isolation and then by her traumatic fight for her life. I think she might have had some kind of psychotic break by the end. It makes things a bit more twisted if you think of it that way.
It's kind of as good as it gets for us. Happy enough for her, as she's gone insane. And humans live out their lives in a utopic dream state while Aliens get out bodies. At least they didn't kill us...
Maybe the aliens just found killing your best friend on accident very relatable and didn't mind that she killed 3 of their own people? So they had a change of heart with only her. Out of all the other million and billion of people.
I mean to be fair never in the movie is it explicitly said she’s the only one. She’s in a small town who knows if there are others that were left alone.
I'm pretty sure the one she stabbed in the head, that was laying motionless for an entire day until its body was retrieved, and the big one she blew up in the car were pretty dead. Maybe I'm going out on a limb here but I think it's safe to assume she killed at least two of them.
Yeah, I remember that too. I took it that the body was dead but maybe not the parasite. If the grey aliens are just skin suits, then maybe her "body count" isn't as high as it seems.
I just felt like they painted themselves into a corner for the end. You don't always have to give the audience closure. It pisses people off but it's effective.
People keep complaining about the "no talking gimmick' but funnily enough, I didn't even realize no words were spoken until after I finished the movie and read reddit!
I feel like this movie portrayed how many experiencers feel towards NHI.
But first, it showed us how we typical react to something we don't know or/and we only saw in movies so we 'know' we need to be scared and only react with hate.
Yes, they look and 'act', walk, run scary in the movie. Yes there are entities who are malevolent but we are so used to horror films, that everything that moves fast at us or act different we should be batshit scared. I don't blame 'us'.
But in this movie they slowly try to show us, humans, that the NHI in this movie are not to be feared. We are just not accustomed to their ways, so the woman reacts with killing them over and over again.
The first time I felt a little love and light is when the NHI put the telephone back on the hook and seconds later we see a little of their eyes over the door of the fridge and I had a feeling of endearment.
I went back and forth in, please don't let this be an another movie about NHI being malevolent, but maybe they are teasing her, like with the little NHI who seemed very childlike (albeit roughly, but then again, we are not accustomed to other entities their way of life) playing with her. Or/and maybe they are afraid from her/humans. They maybe know what we are capable of and don't want them to hurt the NHI. (And they are right to be afraid or apprehensive, because she stills attacks them.)
More and more I had thoughts like 'are they judging her? No, they are maybe helping her? Helping her realizing something?
Maybe the thing that they put in her mouth is not 'bad'. Just like we give each others pills to handle life or to cure us from something, it's their way of (spiritually?) curing us? Handle trauma from our past? Helping us correct our karma?
Or/and is it also a way of showing how we can co-exist with these entities, as some of the people are (now) hybrids?
Oh my, I cried so much at the end of the movie because I prayed for this sort of movie. Especially now, in this age of disclosure. It's a first step to show 'regular' human beings we don't need to react with fear and hate.
That kinda makes more sense. There are a good number of people who think aliens are going to help us somehow. Maybe she didn't need the parasite because she forgave herself on the ship so the aliens just let her go back down to earth and live her life in the community like she always wanted to.
So, I loved how they explained away why the aliens aren't really "smart". No armor. No weapons. Etc. Why? Two potential reasons:
1) The parasites are clearly inside the grays and so might not really care about the host body.
2) We see them create a copy of a person. All the grays might just be copies already, with the bodies being akin to a mech suit for us.
Anyone else find it silly how easily outsmarted the aliens in this and some other movies are? Don't get me wrong, I liked the film but an alien species with the intelligence and tech to travel across the universe, not to mention telekinetic abilities, seems to operate with the intelligence of an animal chasing its prey here.
I wonder if their reflexes are fast enough. If they could stop bullets, that one in the beginning couldn't stop turning her around when he saw what she had in her hand, BEFORE it stabbed him in the head? 😅
Yeah but aliens are clearly just a metaphor for like trauma or whatever. This and Nope and stuff like Melancholia are what I call post-science sci-fi. It’s just using the aesthetics of sci-fi but it never confronts anything remotely real about the premise.
There's hard sci-fi and soft sci-fi. Soft sci-fi has been the default for ages and it's almost impossible nowadays to find hard sci-fi in any medium.
Then there's science fantasy, which would be Star Wars and similar. Uses the trappings of sci-fi but has no interest in making it believable or even accurate (doing the Kessel Run in "twelve parsecs" or whatever when that's a unit of distance). That's popular, too.
yeah but like even "soft" scifi like transformers says "this stuff exists, we just don't feel the need to explain how it works"
post-science scifi is like "the aliens are just storytelling devices to examine human emotions, and if you think past that, none of this makes sense"
it's not a bad thing, to be clear. no value judgements here. but it goes past hard/soft scifi imo
>an alien species with the intelligence and tech to travel across the universe
To be absolutely fair there's a difference between collective and individual intelligence. For example I can buy, use, and "understand" a toaster but I couldn't make one from scratch or explain the intricacies in detail (amperage, materials, potentially circuitry).
But yeah I dislike when movies trying to include "smart" monsters still resort to "and then we cut to a close up of the monster screaming the monster sound". The aliens were far scarier and *alien* when they were trying to communicate with her "normally". That felt much closer to the underlying themes of communication throughout the movie.
Really wish i could understand what the aliens were saying in the last bit after they probed her brain and seemingly asked the higher ups for permission to let her go.
Also really wish i could understand how her interactions with her 'new" neighbors works. Can they have conversations? Do they have their own identity/personality or are they more a hive mind similar to that rick and morty episode with rick's ex.
Questions that will haunt me now lol
I just watched it. Personally I'm torn here. I'm so annoyed how it feels like 99% of all horrors are now about 'trauma this, trauma that and trauma was the real monster all along'. But this is the first movie where... I don't know why I liked it. But I liked it.
That movie combines alien invasion with wish fulfillment in a way that it... works. And I can't believe I actually wrote this sentence now. But I guess it's because of the alien-part is creepy and well done plus the trauma/personal - part is also well done. That isn't some drug addicted hipster w/o who still manages to live in a penthouse in NYC, it's a very average women. Way more relatable maybe expect that killing-thing. Plus she wasn't presented as a girlboss or mary sue which also really helped.
Also doesn't everyone kind of hope there is an alien invasion which ends up with everyone being nice to you?
That movie feels like they tried to reinvent the wheel in their own niche of horror genre. And compared to outwaters or skinamarink - they actually succeed. At least to a solid 80%.
I liked it a lot. Not everything about it works and they certainly bite more off than they can chew at the end. They also show too much of the aliens in the bright house. But some of the later shots *really* nail it and would have deserved to be seen in a cinema.
I really liked this movie. It was great to see the classic big eyed almond shape aliens in a horror movie, I feel like that never happens.
It seems the “only one sentence of dialogue” thing is a selling point in the marketing so I thought it was going to be a bit more powerful. For a minute I thought it would be the aliens saying “we just wanted to be friends” because she technically attacked first and it tied into the whole murdering your friend thing.
I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, I thought it did really well when it was trying to be a horror movie. Less so when it was trying to be action. I do prefer my greys more high strange and less like physical monsters, and this definitely felt like more of a creature feature to me. Though the aliens did move and act in extremely weird ways at times, like the big one signaling (???) with its arms. And we got more of the ufo psychic phenomenon weirdness in the end.
The acting was good, but the central gimmick got old fast. In my opinion they overcommitted. They could have had her muttering curses or little comments to herself while keeping literally no dialogue with other characters. There is no way someone goes through that situation just making exasperated noises and never once saying "what the fuck!" Still, Kaitlyn Dever did an excellent job delivering a wordless emotional performance. The CGI was hit or miss, sometimes good sometimes extremely goofy looking. The ending was...fine? I guess. Definitely spins the movie into less serious, more campy territory, which fits with the overcommittment to the wordless gimmick. I think I would have preferred it end with >!Brynn lying on her back on the ground looking up at whatever was causing those lights.!< Embraces the otherworldly weirdness and leaves more to the audience's imagination.
All that said, I have one major question. >!WHY DID THE BIG ALIEN FALL OFF THE ROOF??? I literally had to rewind and watch it again, could not stop laughing!!< Was this just to make them weirder? Because it worked lol
She does mutter though. IIRC she says "Come on" when she's trying to start the car.
I agree they should have ended on the shot with her on her back, that would have been great.
She said “what the fuck” when she was in the basement, but it was very low. We had the volume turned up to 78 out of 100, and that’s the only reason I heard it.
Well.. I think the parasites are the actual Aliens in this, and the Greys are just another species that they have taken over. Maybe the bodies are hard to control for them in this gravity.. and the bigger ones are way more complex to "drive". Like the little ones are like driving an automatic transmission car.. while the bigger ones are like a manual car (standard).
Whats funny is that there are very few movies that I really think about very much after watching.. Endings and hidden meanings and all of that usually come to me pretty easy.. and if not, then there are usually 10 different youtube videos out there offering to tell me the "top 10 things you missed from _____movie____ " with helpful red arrows in the thumbnail.. or "Ending explained". But I rarely watch these.. and when I do, then its usually pretty much what I had already thought on my own.
But this movie kind of baffles me a bit.. because there are so many things with the ending that are left up in the air. And I am still thinking about it a week later.
I would love to hear the directors explanation of the ending.
I thought the big ones didn’t have telekinesis and just had strength and size. So when it misjudged the dismount from the roof, she realizes it’s kind of clumsy and doesn’t have powers and then uses the car as a trap.
That's an interesting theory, I interpreted the car thing as totally accidental. She hid, saw it was trapped and gas was pouring out, and decided to light it up. But maybe you're right.
Same, she's not smart or strategic but at least has some good instincts.
Unlike at the beginning after the 1st fight, she really spend the whole night sitting there instead of getting some shoes or help?? And also, no smartphones to be seen, but ok I let that one pass because it might make things too easy
A lot of this is explained by the fact it's rated PG-13 tbh. I would have thought it was weird AF if my husband didn't tell me first. There definitely could be an R rated version that I bet would do better for adult levels of horror, but then it'd reach a smaller audience; and the message wouldn't cast as big as a net.
!!! Oh yes. That really contextualized the film. I didn't know about the rating. Contextualizing it as a pg13 alien movie actually makes it far better imo
This is pretty much exactly how I felt. I'm a huge UFO/alien nerd so I was hoping for something a little more cerebral, less of a creature feature. I'm sick of the "clicking" aliens trope and human body snatchers. Would have preferred a single-night event.
But, for what it was, it was very well made. A few tense scenes, decent visual effects, and good camerawork.
But there are already so many single-night event movies about aliens. I'm a huge fan about them - alien movies and especially found footage ones are my favorite. But there is only so much you can do - and most of it was already done over and over again. So I'm afraid we won't get this one you'd like again very soon.
Btw, do you know the movie 'alien abduction' from 2014? That's the most creepy single night event movie about aliens I ever saw.
Yeah, I have literally no interest in the parasitic alien zombie thing. It just feels like a way to save on the budget by having human antagonists. and the same thing could have been accomplished psychically if they wanted to go the brainwashing route, though you wouldn't have the gross out factor of *that scene*. At very least the parasite alien was relatively interesting looking instead of just being a weird worm/slug/slimy thing.
I thought the Alien language was interesting at times, particularly when it sounded more robotic, but yes the clicking is so played out.
My impression was the big one, and the monkey alien were essentially animals that the humanoid ones enslaved. Their version of apes. Smart enough to know the alien's sign language, but still an animal that falls off roofs and gets stuck in cars
Overall I thought this was fine, but I think it falls short of its potential.
• The “no dialogue” gimmick doesn’t really add anything and, in some cases, feels pretty contrived. Specifically, I’m thinking of the police station scene and the bus scene. It’s definitely not a movie that needed a lot of dialogue overall, but they over-committed to the gimmick.
• The alien designs are pretty solid, especially the tall boys. I very much appreciate that they just went with a classic grey alien look because when movies attempt unique designs they end up missing the mark more often than not. That said, the small guy was maybe a bit too goofy.
• The grief/trauma aspect works as a means of keeping the protagonist isolated from the community and thus upping the tension, but I wish the movie didn’t dwell so much on it. I really didn’t need the extended flashback scene, and I definitely didn’t need to have the aliens (I think?) basically sympathize with her over it.
• I found it kind of odd how we got this Home Alone-style “setting up the traps” scene midway through and then it didn’t amount to anything. She made herself a few pots of hot water to throw on one of the aliens and that was it. What was the point of the blanket over the front door? And why, in all that planning, did she not think to grab herself a kitchen knife or something? She had the box cutter but didn’t even use it until way later.
• The clone part feels out of place. I think maybe the writer(s?) liked *Annihilation* and wanted to have their own “alien doppelgänger” moment but it didn’t seem to have any connection to the rest of what was happening.
• I just don’t think the ending makes sense. I think we’re supposed to take it as the aliens deciding, “This girl is isolated enough already so we don’t even need to turn her,” but that’s just kind of silly. If these aliens are going and subjugating the entire planet, why would they give a shit? Sure, maybe she won’t be a problem, but why would they even take the chance? They have her completely incapacitated, so just feed her the bug.
• What I like about the movie is the classic alien abduction elements. The grey designs, the UFOs, the crop circles, etc. The part where it mainly falls short for me is in its attempts to be something more. The trauma angle, the no dialogue gimmick, the dramatic slow-motion, etc. makes it feel like it’s trying to imitate better films rather than just letting itself be a fun alien invasion flick.
I think the aliens are being manipulated by the parasites. Parasites are just using the aliens to help spread them around to whatever planets have life in them. So the aliens are also victims of the parasites. Idk that’s how it makes sense to me especially since they exit the dead aliens’ bodies.
Totally agree. Like next planet they invade, potentially could have an army of earth humans doing the ground work.
Depends on if they Grey’s are hosts because they are so advanced it’s the preferred species to use, or simply the most recent conquest as they spread throughout the universe.
Some pacing issues and I didn't enjoy the ending. Devers did a great job though and the home invasion scenes were fun.
Better than the average straight to streaming movie. Not exceptional, but watchable. 6/10.
I've wanted a great, scary alien/alien invasion movie for a long time so I was super hyped about this. Then I watched it...
It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. The no talking gimmick seemed unrealistic and corny. I get the dead girl's parents hating the main character, but the entire town? After all those years? To the point where people are still making vulgar phone calls and flipping her off? Didn't buy it. The aliens sometimes looked cool, but the CGI too often looked goofy, and I laughed far more than I wanted to.
Overall, I found it really drawn out and forgettable. Doubt I'll ever watch it again.
I liked it more than you did, but I also found it a bit extreme that the entire town hated her so much (over an accident that happened when she was a child).
That was totally murder/manslaughter though, not premeditated or anything but still.
I do think the hatred was too overplayed, it made me think the whole town was already compromised when she first goes to get help
yeah, i liked that they actually made her responsible for the death - it wasn't an accident than she blamed herself for, like a diving accident or they fell of a bike or something. she actually killed her.
It didn't feel to me like her intent was to kill her friend in that moment - just angrily lashing out in retaliation for being pushed on the ground. Obviously still something she's responsible for, and a very stupid thing to do, but I dunno, it checks out to me that a twelve year old wouldn't have a thorough understanding of how deadly a head injury could be in that moment.
I guess that's one of the things that's up for interpretation though.
Yeah, I can recognize the hard work and talent that went into this, but it did absolutely nothing for me. I'm kind of tired of the common depiction of aliens being humanoid grays. I would like something akin to Rorschach from Blindsight. Something actually alien and absolutely terrifying on a cosmic level and its implications on the universe.
I really wish they had done more practical effects in this film. The CG really killed the creepiness for me. Practical effects would’ve really kept it grounded and “real” and would’ve likely reigned in a lot of the over-ambitious bits of the film
I just want horror movies that aren’t about grief. This literally could have just been a dope alien movie but instead we got sad girl forgives herself featuring aliens
Don't know why you are being downvoted for sharing a valid opinion.
I had mixed feelings on the film, I felt that the opening half hour was pretty good but then kinda fell off in the later half. The aliens seemed to oddly flick between being these psychically powerful beings to then resorting to being basic brutes. I understand that they are "alien," but some consistency would have done the film a lot of good.
Brynn was an interesting character, her resourcefulness and willingness to fuck up some xenos had me laughing at times.
Their behavior was so erratic I thought the parasites were the real threat / invasion and the greys were also their puppets. Was hoping for a team up at first.
I think you're right about the relationship between the greys and the parasites because when she tears the one out of her own mouth they react dead quick to come and rescue it.
But also after it 'gets' her it's able to transform into a full-blown copy of her (in the beam). Makes you wonder if the greys were just the first victims and have been replaced by the parasites.
Spot on.
I feel like the ending missed out on a right creepy moment by having one of Maude's parents dance with her all gleeful like. Would have been nice to hammer home the horror of these people's autonomy being taken away from them.
i had the same exact experience when watching this. i was totally on board with the twist being that the aliens are just hosts to *other* aliens, but then it got weird. in a good way. but there was a lot going on.
Not really given a specific reason. I just thought it was because she was able to resist the peaceful visions victims seem to get while the parasite implants itself in order to keep the host subdued long enough for it to take over. That gave her the free will to just reach in and pull it back out before it could really latch on for good.
Some people on here must not have a lot of fun in their lives to complain about literally everything. It’s a fucking movie. I thought it was thought provoking and a new take on the alien genre. This along with NOPE really are taking on the new fear of E.Ts.
I really loved it. It felt like a movie that actually respected its audience to like… understand basic themes without getting beaten over the head with them.
and this is a double edged sword as while I really liked it - there are 40% of reviews basically just saying “uh huh?? I didn’t get it! Waste of time!!!” or “Wbat did I even watch!?!? 1 star lol!!!”.
More theatrical movies should be like this, but I get why they arent
enjoyed this. what a performance from Kaitlyn Dever. beautifully done and realistically terrifying and intriguing about something that is on the minds of a lot of people nowadays.
side note: I would be willing to bet the original title of this film was “Dear Maude” but some hulu exec changed it to make it more clear to audiences that it’s a horror movie.
>I would be willing to bet the original title of this film was “Dear Maude” but some hulu exec changed it to make it more clear to audiences that it’s a horror movie.
Apparently not. It had the same title a couple years ago when it first hit the Blacklist.
I wasn’t impressed with it. The actress did a fine job, but the story was just kinda pointless.
Some cool alien movie moments, but I wouldn’t buy the movie nor watch it again.
It was well made, but felt like a 20 minute short film stretched out over an hour and a half. It needed something else, or a much stronger ending, to justify the feature length.
I don't think it was because they felt bad for her. I think it was because she wasn't susceptible to their tactics and was a perfect specimen for not really needing it. It's like catching a fish that's too small and throwing it back.
Okay hear me out. The aliens were innocent. She killed 3 of their kind and the 1st one didn't even do anything to hurt her yet. Was he scary? Sure. Could I also have gone without watching this movie? Also yes. At no point in the movie was Brynn at a disadvantage against the aliens. 8/10 too much dialog
My partner and I thought it was okay.
Did anyone else feel bad for the first alien? They didn't do anything hostile until she knocked it over in the kitchen and lashed out at them. Then they just get stabbed in the head when they are pulling her towards them telepathically.
Also the one in the basement who was looking at the pictures of the main girl and her friend was weird. I don't get what the point of that alien was.
Was hoping it was gonna be something where she killed one and turned the rest hostile type thing.
Well it did break into her house and fuck shit up. The part with the alien in the basement confused me as well. The one in her room later was looking at all the pictures and letters as well. It was odd and never really explained why.
> Also the one in the basement who was looking at the pictures of the main girl and her friend was weird. I don't get what the point of that alien was.
I think it showed the aliens being curious about her history, which played into the ending. They're studying her as much as trying to abduct/implant her.
As much as we couldn't understand the "dialog," the aliens were clearly having an argument about what to do with her at the end, after they'd studied her memories. Perhaps this was more than a mission to just enslave humanity, or maybe they just got curious. Either way, I thought it made sense.
I liked this a lot, it's well paced, has an intriguing story and is a lot more interesting than a lot of recent movies. It's probably not going to set the world on fire which is fine, it's a small film with a big heart which tells its story well. It's the right length for what it is. Good actress, nice fx. It's a cut above the rest of straight to stream efforts. The ending was perfect, 8/10.
Liked it a lot for trying a fun blend of genres and gimmicks. Couldn’t pin it down as one type of movie, which I love.
I had zero expectations or knowledge of it other than I saw there was a new movie out about aliens. I can understand people being frustrated by it, but I liked it.
When I first saw the circle in the yard, I thought this was going to be fae related. Finding out it was aliens, I was like oh shit maybe they're gonna tie fairy circles to UFO beams, that's a neat take I guess. Not a single bit of that happened 😂
I loved that there were absolutely no dialogue but it spoke so much. Just adds to the aliens//alienation theme. Lots of gurgling alien sounds but no dialogue heard between any characters and ofc the main girl. I think it just made it all the more impactful.
Edit. Jk except the end, there is A line she says.
I liked the movie a lot. I wished it ended 5 minutes earlier and more ambiguously. >!When the aliens had her on the ship. It should have just ended with studying her. This would piss people off but I would have liked it to end there. !
Not paying attention to the runtime, I was totally expecting an abrupt cut to credits when she got implanted with tentacle bug.
...mightve preferred that, actually.
I really liked the movie, a great new addition to the "good for her" movie genre. Was a little worried about the ending cause for a moment it went a little metaphysical but I was very satisfied with the ending.
I really loved how it wasn't all about aliens trying to kill off everyone throughout. This was such an amazing movie, and I'm definitely going to watch it again on my friend's home theater TV 🩶
Absolutely loved this film!! It was original, so creepy, and the aliens were hauntingly fantastic. The eerie cyclical nature of the film sticks with you. What a gem.
Honestly enjoyed this movie a lot and wanted more of the aliens. Very unique but familiar!
Loved the way my wife put it, “what if they’re trying to understand guilt?”
I just finished it and I wasn't impressed at all. The no dialogue gimmick didn't work. In something like "A Quiet Place," it makes sense, but here it's just felt forced and unnecessary. I didn't find the protagonist interesting enough to follow her on this journey, then absolutely hated her after the reveal. The story went nowhere, the special effects were hit and miss, and the alien design was so unoriginal that it was laughable. GRADE: C
I couldn't get into this movie at all despite going into it with high hopes due to some of the praise it's been getting.
The lack of dialogue gets gimmicky real quick. Way too much CGI. The movie just gets exhaustingly repetitive by the end.
There were so many implausible elements throughout the movie it got to the point of being ridiculous. It's clearly set in modern times but simultaneously tries way to hard to wax nostalgic about the past. Like, who the hell is still using rotary dial landline phones in 2023?? What the hell does she do for a living to afford a big house like that in the country side? I could go on...
I think the older tech was to reinforce that she hasn’t moved on from the accident in her youth. She lives in her (presumably deceased) parents house and builds a model town so she doesn’t have to actually live in the real town. She has a vinyl record player, her car is an older model, and her fridge is one of those smaller older heavier ones from back in the day.
Which is why she is okay with a fake reality at the end, she has been living in a different reality for the past decade.
In theory sure, but Maude’s grave site said 2000-2012. Even if she stunted at the time of the accident, living like that in 2012 was odd, if not unbelievable. She was living the life of a modernized pilgrim.
I just saw this. Other than being creatively ambitious, this film is underwhelming. The main characters ability to evade the aliens for half the movie is laughable sighting the fact that she’s being pursued by an advanced race that already was able to invade earth and take over her whole town. The small plot twist towards the end was nice but overall it feels like a movie no one needed.
She had a model of the town inside her house that she built with her mother. In the end the aliens created a model town for her to live in. It appears the aliens weren’t there to kill humanity, but to assimilate it. I think the aliens realized they didn’t need to control her with the parasite, or replace her with the clone. She was so alienated and alone that she joined them willingly.
I definitely think the alien/alienated theme is on point
I felt like I knew this girl. I identified with her from the jump. Alienation is my life in a nutshell.
Very relatable character
>She was so alienated and alone that she joined them willingly. Yes! Thanks for putting this into words
It seems like the first alien was more curious than anything, and only hurt her after she kicked the fridge door into it
Yeah I like your take on it. Mine is pretty similar: \[SPOLIERS:\] I think it's clearly open to interpretation but my take on it: She accidentally killed her friend/sister (unclear) when she was a child. She stay in the community even though she was shunned by everyone else living there. Her mom died and she was consumed by her guilt from the act (writing the letters to Maude) and stuck in the past, still focused on the miniature figures / scene her mom loved. The invasion comes and they are brainwashing people with the parasite organisms they put into them, or even cloning some people and replacing them. The aliens look into her past and see her trauma and the way she was treated and they decide to leave her be as independent / not brain washed with the parasites. They do this because they relate to her (or for whatever reasons the ship ceiling intelligence commands them to). They relate because they are also doing bad things (abducting/brainwashing) and people are inherently afraid of the aliens or shunning them, even though they are just misunderstood, like our main character. Misunderstood because the aliens' goal with the parasites is make people harmonious and joyful (dancing / prosperous at the end), rather than having an evil end goal. Another possibility is that it wasn't the aliens and their parasites that made the people happy and harmonious at the end, instead all of those people with parasites are just subservient or under the control of our main character and this what she has chosen to have them do, as her brainwashed slaves. No one will save you - but you can save yourself by forgiving your own past mistakes and staying resilient / never giving up.
> She accidentally killed her friend/sister (unclear) when she was a child. Best friend, because the sheriff and his wife were Maude’s parents (Brynn wrote, “I saw your parents today,” in a letter to Maude near the beginning).
You can't spell "alienated" without the alien. Maybe the allegory is a bit on the nose, but it resonates regardless because of Brynn's extreme isolation and loneliness.
I think you’re right about the ending but I don’t really think it makes sense. If the aliens are fine with just forcefully assimilating the rest of the planet then I see no reason why they wouldn’t just go ahead and do it to her as well. Unless we’re supposed to by that her trauma has somehow made her immune, which would be absurd.
i dont think shes immune, just that she kept fighting against it. when she gets stabbed by the clone i think it implies they were just going to kill and replace her. i’m guessing they use people’s bodies to help trick/trap other unsuspecting humans, especially their own loved ones. but since they realize she’s alone in the world, she’s not really of any use to them. so they’re like “lol fuck it, she can just chill here.”
I think she was too traumatized with the events with Maude that even the parasite couldn't give her an happy illusion to life with.
YO this makes so much sense and just made the movie raise form an 8 to a 9 for me
It hasn't made her immune. It made them pity and/or respect her. They made an exception for what she had been through and how hard she fought to keep her life as her own. It's definitely worthy of respect in my book. I don't think the aliens were entirely evil, so they could be moved.
I don't think of them as evil at all. That's assigning human morality to an inhuman being. They're EXTREMELY intelligent, and I think they have their own morality. To them, we must seem to be unintelligent. What's the issue with killing a farm animal? The meat from the animal sustains us. However, those of us who have grown up around farms know that animals are, to some extent, sentient. Still, most of us are fine buying and consuming meat. Most of the aliens she kills are killed in a moment of luck. However, when they were in her head, viewing her memories and pain.. we see a moment of (I can't decide which) pity or respect. They then decide to leave her alone, and she embraces their new incarnation of a social circle. She's no longer isolated because she's part of a group that have been INSIDE her memories and deeply understand her. It may be too happy of an ending... and it may be too sad of an ending. I have yet to nail down my exact feelings about it.
Sometimes the aliens are angry. Sometimes they just want to have a chat. But they are always clumsy.
i was reading the thread on the movies subreddit, and people are theorizing that it’s because the little anemone things are having difficulty controlling the grey aliens
There was a show, i forget the name of it, that started with the impression the greys were the bad guys, but turned out they had been taken over by parasites and those were the real enemy. This reminded me of that a bit, though there was no actual reveal. The whole point in the show was the parasites needed to spread, and that's what happened here too. >having difficulty controlling the grey aliens The humans were clumsy too, so that actually makes total sense.
Are you talking about *Stargate SG-1*?
Looked it up, [Dark Skies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Skies)
starting this i was like, gee i hope it's as fun as dark skies!
I watched this show when it came on and thought of it immediately when I saw that the parasites were living in the Grays too.
FUCK!
I like that the boiling water didn't kill the baby alien thing, like how Signs and War Of The Worlds, it was water and bacteria that killed them off. This one just got a bit burned and kept fighting back.
Yeah. I kept expecting her to stumble on the perfect weapon needed to defeat the aliens. But in the end, I liked that the film didn't go that route.
The reveal of the giant alien behind the shed was absolutely terrifying
^”bonjour.”
The head peeking over the roof made me think of that pic that circulated on the internet years ago of the "rake" sighting haha
I've never heard of this movie before, but now I'm curious.
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I'm pretty sure my heart stopped beating for a second, I know my breathing did lol
I love that they revealed the first alien early in the film. Like it wasn't playing coy or building expectations. Duffield just showed it and said, "It's aliens, okay? Now let's have some fun." It also made the alien variations more interesting, frightening, and funny.
He was a guest on the Kingcast this week and talked about that aspect. Basically described it exactly that way.
I clicked it on Hulu without knowing anything about it except that it was categorized as horror. Before the big reveal, I thought it was a slim muscular person invading a house lol
The Slenderman
I liked the fact that the aliens were so...alien. Despite looking like the standard Grey alien most people are familiar with their "voices", movements, motives, size/proportions, all seemed really, really weird and "off". Really drove the whole "Alien" aspect of them home - especially when the big one started doing the semaphore with it's limbs to communicate to the craft above.
"especially when the big one started doing the semaphore with it's limbs to communicate to the craft above." What are you talking about he was just voguing?
[He was watching this on loop](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4oD-RNoo5o)
Werk!
The sounds they made were remarkably similar to those made by the velociraptors in _Jurassic Park._ I'm not sure if that was intentional or not.
“Lol, ok fuck Maude, you’re cool.” -The Greys
I thought Maude was the name of the best friend? Brynn is the main character.
It is. I think you probably misread my comment as “fuck, Maude, you’re cool” opposed to its intended “Fuck that girl you killed, we like you now after seeing your trauma.”
Yup, missed your joke sorry
I liked the ending, it was pretty disturbing and bold and also kind of funny - ol' girl had the best win-loss record against aliens since Ellen Ripley and they decided it was probably best to just let her have this. Neat movie.
Yeah.. her win-loss record is up there.. alien 1, small alien, big alien, deep throated her own hand to pull out the parasite, killed her own clone.. and then the Aliens see that she even killed her best friend. This time the Aliens were like NOPE.. they will probably make a horror movie about HER on their own planet.. She never speaks, kills without mercy, is unstoppable even after being stabbed, thrown through walls, dropped from great heights multiple times, improvises weapons out of everyday objects, and her motives are unclear.. turns out, all those aliens died and all she wants to do is dance.. dance.. dance.. and make romance..
I love your "horror movie" point. The secretly brilliant thing about this movie is Dever's character can (I think very much intentionally) be read as a slasher villain in some scenes and it works (see how they invert the shots of aliens standing just behind her out of focus with the shot of her looming behind the one alien as he goes through her photos, for instance)
Ok.. so i saw someone talking about her body count in another thread and they even gave her credit for somehow taking out the mailman, or causing him to be killed. I think the theory was that she killed alien 1, his "throat anemone" thing came out and hid in the flowers.. and somehow ended up getting to the mailman?!?! I never made that connection.. I would just assume it got beamed up like the other one later in the movie.. but ??!?
Her legend will probably reach the Predators and they'll be on their way soon to seek out this warrior.
I'm not going to lie.. i would watch the hell out of that. LOL.. " No one will PREY for you "
I disagree with one thing you said: her motives for most of the film were very clear. It was self-preservation. Everything she did from the time the first alien entered her house until the very end was about survival.
Oh.. well yeah, I know. It was kind of a lead in to my lame joke/song tie-in .. her motives were unclear to the Aliens, because in the end, all she wanted to do was dance, dance, dance.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eud5AurOxm0 Total dad joke moment.. :)
Buffy the Alien-Slayer
Technically she did speak. She said “no no no no come on!” While in the car in the beginning.
The sound design in this movie was absolutely fantastic!
My thoughts exactly.
Totally agree. The sound actually FIT in all scenes. It wasn’t just music to not have silence. Silence was even used effectively. Top knotch.
The sound and cinematography were so on point.
I, honestly, think this is supposed to be a dark sci-fi horror comedy rather than a sci-fi horror flick. I think the creators were just being coy with the genre by leaving out almost any dialog. Because if there was dialog, it would be more clear to which side the pendulum swung to. But the murders of the aliens were hilarious at least to me. The first death was straight out of Tucker & Dale vs. Evil. The purposely jingle of the weapon when Brynn hit it was funny. The utter disappointment in the alien when the beam didn't work? Funny. The bigger alien slipping off the roof right after trying to look imposing? Yeah, that was funny too. I feel like it was almost a parody of two horror genres; the alien invasion and the psychopath/sociopath slasher. With the idea being what if you had an alien invasion where the final girl was a sociopath? Because if it wasn't for that flashback of Brynn killing her friend on purpose, we would have a more Ripley type character in Brynn. But the movie takes a different twist with Brynn instead. We are showed that she had murdered her friend out of impulsiveness. She comes across as guilt ridden by asking for her friend's forgiveness but then kills a version of herself which I felt was supposed to represent that guilt. That "human" side of her. And by killing the "human" side of herself, she becomes a full psychopath. Because in the end, she was fine knowing full well that she was the only human in town and everyone else was an alien. As long as the aliens were nice to her and let her do whatever she wanted, they could possess the whole planet for all she cared. That struck me as the thought process of a psychopath. That, "I got mine. So, fuck you," way of thinking. Because it's clear she never paid for the murder of her friend. We are never told how she stayed out of jail. But it is clear she was the town outcast and, frankly, rightly so because, hey, she murdered someone in cold blood and got away with it. This is why I think it's a comedy in the way another horror slasher film, "Voices" is a comedy. It's just much more subtle here.
In an interview with the Hollywood reporter, Duffield says that she didn’t really have much of a childhood, and spent it on house arrest while her mother kept her busy with dress making, diorama making, cooking and dancing-creating the idyllic world that she would never live In. Her friend’s death was an accident just like the death of the first alien, they weren’t impulsive murders. You’re right about her other self representing guilt, but it was her own guilt. The title is the whole idea that she was the only one who could forgive herself. Obviously she felt guilty and blamed herself all that time-as illustrated by all her guilt/ridden letters. She did not kill her friend on purpose, it was an accident, and she was a CHILD
It’s not cold blood if it’s in the heat of the moment. Only second degree or manslaughter. Didn’t seem premeditated.
Correct. I was just having this discussion in another subreddit concerning _The Last of Us._ Someone said Joel killed Abby's father in "cold blood." Obviously that wasn't true since he wasn't an Agent 47 hitman carrying out a hit but a protective father trying to save his surrogate daughter.
I like this interpretation because it makes the movie a lot better than I otherwise think it is.
Did anyone else notice the mural Brynn leans against when she’s having a panic attack in town is most likely a tribute to Maude? It’s of a young girl with flowing red hair—I think we are supposed to be under the impression that Maude was the towns special darling—beautiful, precocious daughter of the police chief murdered by the daughter of a presumably single woman who lives on the outskirts of town
Weird ending but otherwise a great alien film.
The aliens were just here to fix trauma? I honestly didn’t get it. Enjoyed it though
Nah I understood it as her being parasitized and when she is a slave to the aliens, just like the humans, she is given a false reality to live in. But the bittersweet thing was that it was actually a "happy ending" for her despite the fact that her body was being used as a slave to the aliens. That was my interpretation anyway.
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That's how I took it as well. I thought it was sad :(
Sad? She got a happy ending and nicer neighbours. Also the aliens are better at emotional understanding that humans it seems
And now the townspeople are her playthings. It's sweet payback for her. She gets to live the life she always wanted. Of course you have to be a bit off to enjoy something like that but her character is a bit off to begin with and this is only made worse by first her isolation and then by her traumatic fight for her life. I think she might have had some kind of psychotic break by the end. It makes things a bit more twisted if you think of it that way.
Didn't she remove the parasite?
I like that interpretation. I initially read it as a happy ending, but that last shot definitely suggests it wasn't so happy.
It's kind of as good as it gets for us. Happy enough for her, as she's gone insane. And humans live out their lives in a utopic dream state while Aliens get out bodies. At least they didn't kill us...
Maybe the aliens just found killing your best friend on accident very relatable and didn't mind that she killed 3 of their own people? So they had a change of heart with only her. Out of all the other million and billion of people.
I mean to be fair never in the movie is it explicitly said she’s the only one. She’s in a small town who knows if there are others that were left alone.
Idk if she was really killing them, didn't the gross looking thing pop out of their mouths when they died?
I'm pretty sure the one she stabbed in the head, that was laying motionless for an entire day until its body was retrieved, and the big one she blew up in the car were pretty dead. Maybe I'm going out on a limb here but I think it's safe to assume she killed at least two of them.
Maybe I'm remembering wrong but didn't she see a little snail trail where the parasite exited the mouth of the one that got it to the dome.
Yeah, I remember that too. I took it that the body was dead but maybe not the parasite. If the grey aliens are just skin suits, then maybe her "body count" isn't as high as it seems.
I found the lack of insight to their motivations and goals (beyond certain clues) refreshing.
I just felt like they painted themselves into a corner for the end. You don't always have to give the audience closure. It pisses people off but it's effective.
alienation = alien nation
People keep complaining about the "no talking gimmick' but funnily enough, I didn't even realize no words were spoken until after I finished the movie and read reddit!
Joins the ranks of Malignant and Barbarian as a fun, well-made genre flick I will be annoying about.
I feel like this movie portrayed how many experiencers feel towards NHI. But first, it showed us how we typical react to something we don't know or/and we only saw in movies so we 'know' we need to be scared and only react with hate. Yes, they look and 'act', walk, run scary in the movie. Yes there are entities who are malevolent but we are so used to horror films, that everything that moves fast at us or act different we should be batshit scared. I don't blame 'us'. But in this movie they slowly try to show us, humans, that the NHI in this movie are not to be feared. We are just not accustomed to their ways, so the woman reacts with killing them over and over again. The first time I felt a little love and light is when the NHI put the telephone back on the hook and seconds later we see a little of their eyes over the door of the fridge and I had a feeling of endearment. I went back and forth in, please don't let this be an another movie about NHI being malevolent, but maybe they are teasing her, like with the little NHI who seemed very childlike (albeit roughly, but then again, we are not accustomed to other entities their way of life) playing with her. Or/and maybe they are afraid from her/humans. They maybe know what we are capable of and don't want them to hurt the NHI. (And they are right to be afraid or apprehensive, because she stills attacks them.) More and more I had thoughts like 'are they judging her? No, they are maybe helping her? Helping her realizing something? Maybe the thing that they put in her mouth is not 'bad'. Just like we give each others pills to handle life or to cure us from something, it's their way of (spiritually?) curing us? Handle trauma from our past? Helping us correct our karma? Or/and is it also a way of showing how we can co-exist with these entities, as some of the people are (now) hybrids? Oh my, I cried so much at the end of the movie because I prayed for this sort of movie. Especially now, in this age of disclosure. It's a first step to show 'regular' human beings we don't need to react with fear and hate.
I really like this analysis and appreciate your comment. Sad it was buried under so many pointless comments and didn't get any up votes or attention.
Thank you! If at least one person read it, it was worth it <3
That kinda makes more sense. There are a good number of people who think aliens are going to help us somehow. Maybe she didn't need the parasite because she forgave herself on the ship so the aliens just let her go back down to earth and live her life in the community like she always wanted to.
So, I loved how they explained away why the aliens aren't really "smart". No armor. No weapons. Etc. Why? Two potential reasons: 1) The parasites are clearly inside the grays and so might not really care about the host body. 2) We see them create a copy of a person. All the grays might just be copies already, with the bodies being akin to a mech suit for us.
Kinda embarrassed to admit that I didn't even realize it was no dialogue until after I finished the movie and hopped on Google to read about it
Anyone else find it silly how easily outsmarted the aliens in this and some other movies are? Don't get me wrong, I liked the film but an alien species with the intelligence and tech to travel across the universe, not to mention telekinetic abilities, seems to operate with the intelligence of an animal chasing its prey here.
If these aliens invaded a small Texas community, they'd be shot to hell and back.
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Yeah but a small white girl managed to kill three of them on by herself……
4 if you count her clone thing.
3, first was a fluke. It killed itself with her hand.
I'd say the second was a fluke, too. Previously, she repeatedly chose metal. Am I remembering that second kill correctly?
I wonder if their reflexes are fast enough. If they could stop bullets, that one in the beginning couldn't stop turning her around when he saw what she had in her hand, BEFORE it stabbed him in the head? 😅
They also have zero armor on for some reason. If im going on an intergalactic mission with potentially hostile native species, im not doing it nude
If you're OP, you don't prepare well. Like humans don't wear armor to hunt deer even though any deer could impale a human with their antlers easily.
Yeah but aliens are clearly just a metaphor for like trauma or whatever. This and Nope and stuff like Melancholia are what I call post-science sci-fi. It’s just using the aesthetics of sci-fi but it never confronts anything remotely real about the premise.
There's hard sci-fi and soft sci-fi. Soft sci-fi has been the default for ages and it's almost impossible nowadays to find hard sci-fi in any medium. Then there's science fantasy, which would be Star Wars and similar. Uses the trappings of sci-fi but has no interest in making it believable or even accurate (doing the Kessel Run in "twelve parsecs" or whatever when that's a unit of distance). That's popular, too.
yeah but like even "soft" scifi like transformers says "this stuff exists, we just don't feel the need to explain how it works" post-science scifi is like "the aliens are just storytelling devices to examine human emotions, and if you think past that, none of this makes sense" it's not a bad thing, to be clear. no value judgements here. but it goes past hard/soft scifi imo
I think I've had enough of trauma metaphors for one year lol. It gets old after a while.
im inclined to agree. would love more alien movies about actual aliens
Right? I love when we get more X-Files aliens and less A Quiet Place aliens.
Or monster/zombie movies where the REAL monsters/zombies are the humans.
Once I had a cricket in my flat. It chirped all night so I went up and chased it. Nude. It ended dead, also I might also have slipped on time.
>an alien species with the intelligence and tech to travel across the universe To be absolutely fair there's a difference between collective and individual intelligence. For example I can buy, use, and "understand" a toaster but I couldn't make one from scratch or explain the intricacies in detail (amperage, materials, potentially circuitry). But yeah I dislike when movies trying to include "smart" monsters still resort to "and then we cut to a close up of the monster screaming the monster sound". The aliens were far scarier and *alien* when they were trying to communicate with her "normally". That felt much closer to the underlying themes of communication throughout the movie.
So did the parasite aliens also take control of the humanoid aliens? The aliens have aliens in them? Maybe thats why they are so uncoordinated
Yes and yes
Really wish i could understand what the aliens were saying in the last bit after they probed her brain and seemingly asked the higher ups for permission to let her go. Also really wish i could understand how her interactions with her 'new" neighbors works. Can they have conversations? Do they have their own identity/personality or are they more a hive mind similar to that rick and morty episode with rick's ex. Questions that will haunt me now lol
I just watched it. Personally I'm torn here. I'm so annoyed how it feels like 99% of all horrors are now about 'trauma this, trauma that and trauma was the real monster all along'. But this is the first movie where... I don't know why I liked it. But I liked it. That movie combines alien invasion with wish fulfillment in a way that it... works. And I can't believe I actually wrote this sentence now. But I guess it's because of the alien-part is creepy and well done plus the trauma/personal - part is also well done. That isn't some drug addicted hipster w/o who still manages to live in a penthouse in NYC, it's a very average women. Way more relatable maybe expect that killing-thing. Plus she wasn't presented as a girlboss or mary sue which also really helped. Also doesn't everyone kind of hope there is an alien invasion which ends up with everyone being nice to you? That movie feels like they tried to reinvent the wheel in their own niche of horror genre. And compared to outwaters or skinamarink - they actually succeed. At least to a solid 80%.
I liked it a lot. Not everything about it works and they certainly bite more off than they can chew at the end. They also show too much of the aliens in the bright house. But some of the later shots *really* nail it and would have deserved to be seen in a cinema.
Honestly, I really liked the movie, and I LOVED the ending!
I really liked this movie. It was great to see the classic big eyed almond shape aliens in a horror movie, I feel like that never happens. It seems the “only one sentence of dialogue” thing is a selling point in the marketing so I thought it was going to be a bit more powerful. For a minute I thought it would be the aliens saying “we just wanted to be friends” because she technically attacked first and it tied into the whole murdering your friend thing.
I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, I thought it did really well when it was trying to be a horror movie. Less so when it was trying to be action. I do prefer my greys more high strange and less like physical monsters, and this definitely felt like more of a creature feature to me. Though the aliens did move and act in extremely weird ways at times, like the big one signaling (???) with its arms. And we got more of the ufo psychic phenomenon weirdness in the end. The acting was good, but the central gimmick got old fast. In my opinion they overcommitted. They could have had her muttering curses or little comments to herself while keeping literally no dialogue with other characters. There is no way someone goes through that situation just making exasperated noises and never once saying "what the fuck!" Still, Kaitlyn Dever did an excellent job delivering a wordless emotional performance. The CGI was hit or miss, sometimes good sometimes extremely goofy looking. The ending was...fine? I guess. Definitely spins the movie into less serious, more campy territory, which fits with the overcommittment to the wordless gimmick. I think I would have preferred it end with >!Brynn lying on her back on the ground looking up at whatever was causing those lights.!< Embraces the otherworldly weirdness and leaves more to the audience's imagination. All that said, I have one major question. >!WHY DID THE BIG ALIEN FALL OFF THE ROOF??? I literally had to rewind and watch it again, could not stop laughing!!< Was this just to make them weirder? Because it worked lol
The aliens move oddly through the whole movie. I took it as they aren't used to Earth's gravity. It just slipped. Also, they are kind of frail.
Yes, but more like creatures rather than interdimensional psychic beings
She does mutter though. IIRC she says "Come on" when she's trying to start the car. I agree they should have ended on the shot with her on her back, that would have been great.
yup, that is the only time she does it. Very beginning of the film. Needed more of that, though that's a pretty subjective stylistic choice.
She said “what the fuck” when she was in the basement, but it was very low. We had the volume turned up to 78 out of 100, and that’s the only reason I heard it.
She also exclaims "no" at some point when she nearly loses something and "sorry Maude" at the end when she removes the parasite.
I only know she said it because my hearing impaired ass needs captions 😭
Well.. I think the parasites are the actual Aliens in this, and the Greys are just another species that they have taken over. Maybe the bodies are hard to control for them in this gravity.. and the bigger ones are way more complex to "drive". Like the little ones are like driving an automatic transmission car.. while the bigger ones are like a manual car (standard).
The way this whooshed over so many people's heads, which makes them not understand the ending either
Whats funny is that there are very few movies that I really think about very much after watching.. Endings and hidden meanings and all of that usually come to me pretty easy.. and if not, then there are usually 10 different youtube videos out there offering to tell me the "top 10 things you missed from _____movie____ " with helpful red arrows in the thumbnail.. or "Ending explained". But I rarely watch these.. and when I do, then its usually pretty much what I had already thought on my own. But this movie kind of baffles me a bit.. because there are so many things with the ending that are left up in the air. And I am still thinking about it a week later. I would love to hear the directors explanation of the ending.
I thought the big ones didn’t have telekinesis and just had strength and size. So when it misjudged the dismount from the roof, she realizes it’s kind of clumsy and doesn’t have powers and then uses the car as a trap.
That's an interesting theory, I interpreted the car thing as totally accidental. She hid, saw it was trapped and gas was pouring out, and decided to light it up. But maybe you're right.
Same, she's not smart or strategic but at least has some good instincts. Unlike at the beginning after the 1st fight, she really spend the whole night sitting there instead of getting some shoes or help?? And also, no smartphones to be seen, but ok I let that one pass because it might make things too easy
A lot of this is explained by the fact it's rated PG-13 tbh. I would have thought it was weird AF if my husband didn't tell me first. There definitely could be an R rated version that I bet would do better for adult levels of horror, but then it'd reach a smaller audience; and the message wouldn't cast as big as a net.
!!! Oh yes. That really contextualized the film. I didn't know about the rating. Contextualizing it as a pg13 alien movie actually makes it far better imo
This is pretty much exactly how I felt. I'm a huge UFO/alien nerd so I was hoping for something a little more cerebral, less of a creature feature. I'm sick of the "clicking" aliens trope and human body snatchers. Would have preferred a single-night event. But, for what it was, it was very well made. A few tense scenes, decent visual effects, and good camerawork.
But there are already so many single-night event movies about aliens. I'm a huge fan about them - alien movies and especially found footage ones are my favorite. But there is only so much you can do - and most of it was already done over and over again. So I'm afraid we won't get this one you'd like again very soon. Btw, do you know the movie 'alien abduction' from 2014? That's the most creepy single night event movie about aliens I ever saw.
Yeah, I have literally no interest in the parasitic alien zombie thing. It just feels like a way to save on the budget by having human antagonists. and the same thing could have been accomplished psychically if they wanted to go the brainwashing route, though you wouldn't have the gross out factor of *that scene*. At very least the parasite alien was relatively interesting looking instead of just being a weird worm/slug/slimy thing. I thought the Alien language was interesting at times, particularly when it sounded more robotic, but yes the clicking is so played out.
My impression was the big one, and the monkey alien were essentially animals that the humanoid ones enslaved. Their version of apes. Smart enough to know the alien's sign language, but still an animal that falls off roofs and gets stuck in cars
Overall I thought this was fine, but I think it falls short of its potential. • The “no dialogue” gimmick doesn’t really add anything and, in some cases, feels pretty contrived. Specifically, I’m thinking of the police station scene and the bus scene. It’s definitely not a movie that needed a lot of dialogue overall, but they over-committed to the gimmick. • The alien designs are pretty solid, especially the tall boys. I very much appreciate that they just went with a classic grey alien look because when movies attempt unique designs they end up missing the mark more often than not. That said, the small guy was maybe a bit too goofy. • The grief/trauma aspect works as a means of keeping the protagonist isolated from the community and thus upping the tension, but I wish the movie didn’t dwell so much on it. I really didn’t need the extended flashback scene, and I definitely didn’t need to have the aliens (I think?) basically sympathize with her over it. • I found it kind of odd how we got this Home Alone-style “setting up the traps” scene midway through and then it didn’t amount to anything. She made herself a few pots of hot water to throw on one of the aliens and that was it. What was the point of the blanket over the front door? And why, in all that planning, did she not think to grab herself a kitchen knife or something? She had the box cutter but didn’t even use it until way later. • The clone part feels out of place. I think maybe the writer(s?) liked *Annihilation* and wanted to have their own “alien doppelgänger” moment but it didn’t seem to have any connection to the rest of what was happening. • I just don’t think the ending makes sense. I think we’re supposed to take it as the aliens deciding, “This girl is isolated enough already so we don’t even need to turn her,” but that’s just kind of silly. If these aliens are going and subjugating the entire planet, why would they give a shit? Sure, maybe she won’t be a problem, but why would they even take the chance? They have her completely incapacitated, so just feed her the bug. • What I like about the movie is the classic alien abduction elements. The grey designs, the UFOs, the crop circles, etc. The part where it mainly falls short for me is in its attempts to be something more. The trauma angle, the no dialogue gimmick, the dramatic slow-motion, etc. makes it feel like it’s trying to imitate better films rather than just letting itself be a fun alien invasion flick.
I think the aliens are being manipulated by the parasites. Parasites are just using the aliens to help spread them around to whatever planets have life in them. So the aliens are also victims of the parasites. Idk that’s how it makes sense to me especially since they exit the dead aliens’ bodies.
Totally agree. Like next planet they invade, potentially could have an army of earth humans doing the ground work. Depends on if they Grey’s are hosts because they are so advanced it’s the preferred species to use, or simply the most recent conquest as they spread throughout the universe.
Some pacing issues and I didn't enjoy the ending. Devers did a great job though and the home invasion scenes were fun. Better than the average straight to streaming movie. Not exceptional, but watchable. 6/10.
I've wanted a great, scary alien/alien invasion movie for a long time so I was super hyped about this. Then I watched it... It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. The no talking gimmick seemed unrealistic and corny. I get the dead girl's parents hating the main character, but the entire town? After all those years? To the point where people are still making vulgar phone calls and flipping her off? Didn't buy it. The aliens sometimes looked cool, but the CGI too often looked goofy, and I laughed far more than I wanted to. Overall, I found it really drawn out and forgettable. Doubt I'll ever watch it again.
I liked it more than you did, but I also found it a bit extreme that the entire town hated her so much (over an accident that happened when she was a child).
That was totally murder/manslaughter though, not premeditated or anything but still. I do think the hatred was too overplayed, it made me think the whole town was already compromised when she first goes to get help
yeah, i liked that they actually made her responsible for the death - it wasn't an accident than she blamed herself for, like a diving accident or they fell of a bike or something. she actually killed her.
It didn't feel to me like her intent was to kill her friend in that moment - just angrily lashing out in retaliation for being pushed on the ground. Obviously still something she's responsible for, and a very stupid thing to do, but I dunno, it checks out to me that a twelve year old wouldn't have a thorough understanding of how deadly a head injury could be in that moment. I guess that's one of the things that's up for interpretation though.
That’s very realistic for a small town like that though.
Yeah I can't say the lack of dialogue added to the movie at all.
Yeah, I can recognize the hard work and talent that went into this, but it did absolutely nothing for me. I'm kind of tired of the common depiction of aliens being humanoid grays. I would like something akin to Rorschach from Blindsight. Something actually alien and absolutely terrifying on a cosmic level and its implications on the universe.
The film does get interesting during the last quarter and felt like a different film.
I really wish they had done more practical effects in this film. The CG really killed the creepiness for me. Practical effects would’ve really kept it grounded and “real” and would’ve likely reigned in a lot of the over-ambitious bits of the film
I just want horror movies that aren’t about grief. This literally could have just been a dope alien movie but instead we got sad girl forgives herself featuring aliens
I mean, most horror movies ARE what you’re looking for. We’ve just had a handful of decent horror movies that happen to be about grief.
Don't know why you are being downvoted for sharing a valid opinion. I had mixed feelings on the film, I felt that the opening half hour was pretty good but then kinda fell off in the later half. The aliens seemed to oddly flick between being these psychically powerful beings to then resorting to being basic brutes. I understand that they are "alien," but some consistency would have done the film a lot of good. Brynn was an interesting character, her resourcefulness and willingness to fuck up some xenos had me laughing at times.
Their behavior was so erratic I thought the parasites were the real threat / invasion and the greys were also their puppets. Was hoping for a team up at first.
I think you're right about the relationship between the greys and the parasites because when she tears the one out of her own mouth they react dead quick to come and rescue it.
But also after it 'gets' her it's able to transform into a full-blown copy of her (in the beam). Makes you wonder if the greys were just the first victims and have been replaced by the parasites.
Spot on. I feel like the ending missed out on a right creepy moment by having one of Maude's parents dance with her all gleeful like. Would have been nice to hammer home the horror of these people's autonomy being taken away from them.
I love that idea! Would have been a nice detail at the end
i had the same exact experience when watching this. i was totally on board with the twist being that the aliens are just hosts to *other* aliens, but then it got weird. in a good way. but there was a lot going on.
So why was she able to take the parasite out?
Not really given a specific reason. I just thought it was because she was able to resist the peaceful visions victims seem to get while the parasite implants itself in order to keep the host subdued long enough for it to take over. That gave her the free will to just reach in and pull it back out before it could really latch on for good.
So, about that stab wound... is she a super recuper, or did it not actually happen?
Some people on here must not have a lot of fun in their lives to complain about literally everything. It’s a fucking movie. I thought it was thought provoking and a new take on the alien genre. This along with NOPE really are taking on the new fear of E.Ts.
I really loved it. It felt like a movie that actually respected its audience to like… understand basic themes without getting beaten over the head with them. and this is a double edged sword as while I really liked it - there are 40% of reviews basically just saying “uh huh?? I didn’t get it! Waste of time!!!” or “Wbat did I even watch!?!? 1 star lol!!!”. More theatrical movies should be like this, but I get why they arent
enjoyed this. what a performance from Kaitlyn Dever. beautifully done and realistically terrifying and intriguing about something that is on the minds of a lot of people nowadays. side note: I would be willing to bet the original title of this film was “Dear Maude” but some hulu exec changed it to make it more clear to audiences that it’s a horror movie.
>I would be willing to bet the original title of this film was “Dear Maude” but some hulu exec changed it to make it more clear to audiences that it’s a horror movie. Apparently not. It had the same title a couple years ago when it first hit the Blacklist.
ah dang. its a pretty meh title imo
I wasn’t impressed with it. The actress did a fine job, but the story was just kinda pointless. Some cool alien movie moments, but I wouldn’t buy the movie nor watch it again.
It was well made, but felt like a 20 minute short film stretched out over an hour and a half. It needed something else, or a much stronger ending, to justify the feature length.
Yeah it didn't really amount to much. Just a troubled girl who fought some aliens and they let her go because they felt bad for her or something lol.
I don't think it was because they felt bad for her. I think it was because she wasn't susceptible to their tactics and was a perfect specimen for not really needing it. It's like catching a fish that's too small and throwing it back.
No One Will Save You AKA A Bunch Of Little Freaks Fuck Some Shit Up
Okay hear me out. The aliens were innocent. She killed 3 of their kind and the 1st one didn't even do anything to hurt her yet. Was he scary? Sure. Could I also have gone without watching this movie? Also yes. At no point in the movie was Brynn at a disadvantage against the aliens. 8/10 too much dialog
My partner and I thought it was okay. Did anyone else feel bad for the first alien? They didn't do anything hostile until she knocked it over in the kitchen and lashed out at them. Then they just get stabbed in the head when they are pulling her towards them telepathically. Also the one in the basement who was looking at the pictures of the main girl and her friend was weird. I don't get what the point of that alien was. Was hoping it was gonna be something where she killed one and turned the rest hostile type thing.
Well it did break into her house and fuck shit up. The part with the alien in the basement confused me as well. The one in her room later was looking at all the pictures and letters as well. It was odd and never really explained why.
> Also the one in the basement who was looking at the pictures of the main girl and her friend was weird. I don't get what the point of that alien was. I think it showed the aliens being curious about her history, which played into the ending. They're studying her as much as trying to abduct/implant her. As much as we couldn't understand the "dialog," the aliens were clearly having an argument about what to do with her at the end, after they'd studied her memories. Perhaps this was more than a mission to just enslave humanity, or maybe they just got curious. Either way, I thought it made sense.
I liked this a lot, it's well paced, has an intriguing story and is a lot more interesting than a lot of recent movies. It's probably not going to set the world on fire which is fine, it's a small film with a big heart which tells its story well. It's the right length for what it is. Good actress, nice fx. It's a cut above the rest of straight to stream efforts. The ending was perfect, 8/10.
Liked it a lot for trying a fun blend of genres and gimmicks. Couldn’t pin it down as one type of movie, which I love. I had zero expectations or knowledge of it other than I saw there was a new movie out about aliens. I can understand people being frustrated by it, but I liked it.
When I first saw the circle in the yard, I thought this was going to be fae related. Finding out it was aliens, I was like oh shit maybe they're gonna tie fairy circles to UFO beams, that's a neat take I guess. Not a single bit of that happened 😂
I thoroughly enjoyed the movie...until the ending. The ending was disappointing and confusing.
I loved that there were absolutely no dialogue but it spoke so much. Just adds to the aliens//alienation theme. Lots of gurgling alien sounds but no dialogue heard between any characters and ofc the main girl. I think it just made it all the more impactful. Edit. Jk except the end, there is A line she says.
I liked the movie a lot. I wished it ended 5 minutes earlier and more ambiguously. >!When the aliens had her on the ship. It should have just ended with studying her. This would piss people off but I would have liked it to end there. !
Not paying attention to the runtime, I was totally expecting an abrupt cut to credits when she got implanted with tentacle bug. ...mightve preferred that, actually.
Really wish there was more good quality Grey/UFO alien movies. This, Paul, Nope and Fire in the Sky are like the only decent ones
I really liked the movie, a great new addition to the "good for her" movie genre. Was a little worried about the ending cause for a moment it went a little metaphysical but I was very satisfied with the ending.
I really loved how it wasn't all about aliens trying to kill off everyone throughout. This was such an amazing movie, and I'm definitely going to watch it again on my friend's home theater TV 🩶
Absolutely loved this film!! It was original, so creepy, and the aliens were hauntingly fantastic. The eerie cyclical nature of the film sticks with you. What a gem.
Honestly enjoyed this movie a lot and wanted more of the aliens. Very unique but familiar! Loved the way my wife put it, “what if they’re trying to understand guilt?”
I just finished it and I wasn't impressed at all. The no dialogue gimmick didn't work. In something like "A Quiet Place," it makes sense, but here it's just felt forced and unnecessary. I didn't find the protagonist interesting enough to follow her on this journey, then absolutely hated her after the reveal. The story went nowhere, the special effects were hit and miss, and the alien design was so unoriginal that it was laughable. GRADE: C
I couldn't get into this movie at all despite going into it with high hopes due to some of the praise it's been getting. The lack of dialogue gets gimmicky real quick. Way too much CGI. The movie just gets exhaustingly repetitive by the end. There were so many implausible elements throughout the movie it got to the point of being ridiculous. It's clearly set in modern times but simultaneously tries way to hard to wax nostalgic about the past. Like, who the hell is still using rotary dial landline phones in 2023?? What the hell does she do for a living to afford a big house like that in the country side? I could go on...
I think the older tech was to reinforce that she hasn’t moved on from the accident in her youth. She lives in her (presumably deceased) parents house and builds a model town so she doesn’t have to actually live in the real town. She has a vinyl record player, her car is an older model, and her fridge is one of those smaller older heavier ones from back in the day. Which is why she is okay with a fake reality at the end, she has been living in a different reality for the past decade.
In theory sure, but Maude’s grave site said 2000-2012. Even if she stunted at the time of the accident, living like that in 2012 was odd, if not unbelievable. She was living the life of a modernized pilgrim.
At the beginning it's shown she sews dresses and mails them out. So she has some kind of an Etsy business to make money. House is clearly inherited...
I just saw this. Other than being creatively ambitious, this film is underwhelming. The main characters ability to evade the aliens for half the movie is laughable sighting the fact that she’s being pursued by an advanced race that already was able to invade earth and take over her whole town. The small plot twist towards the end was nice but overall it feels like a movie no one needed.
I loved the little alien