THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, June 1, 1996 TAG: 9606010041
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Movie Review
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, MOVIE CRITIC
LENGTH: 75 lines
SOME LIKE IT HOT.
In the case of ``The Arrival,'' they are icky, ``watch-out'' extraterrestrials who have come to Earth knowing that it is inhabited by ignorant, wasteful humans who are ignoring the fact that the North Pole may melt at any moment, or any century, and turn the entire place into a nice sandy tanning palace. These creatures are in the mood to wait.
``The Arrival,'' complete with plenty of ultra-silly moments, is an entertaining drive-in movie in an era in which we no longer have drive-in theaters. There is something reassuring, though, that movies like ``The Arrival'' still exist.
Director-writer David Twohy is making his directing debut in this not-very-subtle tale of aliens who take human form and spread their dissent amongst us. He has obviously borrowed from ``Invasion of the Body Snatchers'' but he, pleasingly, has also borrowed from Alfred Hitchcock. He sees horror in broad sunshine among everyday occurrences.
Charlie Sheen plays a nerdish scientist who hears a signal from outer space during his long hours at the radio. Promptly, mysteriously, he is fired from his job. Friends, who know about the signal, disappear, or are murdered outright. On his own, he discovers that the signal is coming from Mexico. Hiding out, and taking a job with a cable-TV operation, he wires the satellite dishes together to get more signals. The search leads to a formidable plant in Mexico were, yes, we actually do, finally, see the ``things.''
They have legs that bend backward at the knee, allowing them to jump like grasshoppers. They have ventilated brains, with skull flaps to cool them off. They're all that computer technology could produce.
Pleasingly, though, the film depends more on humanized suspense than special effects. Everyone is suspect in a world of bureaucrats and big government. Twohy uses paranoia the same way the Red Scare directors did back in the 1950s - a period that was the heyday of alarm movies like this.
It's pretty easy to guess which of the humans are actually aliens, even though there is an overabundant helping of Red Herrings served along the way.
Ron Silver is Sheen's evil boss, a man so slithery that he looks like an alien, even in a business suit. Terri Polo, who dates back to the TV's miniseries ``Phantom of the Opera'' with Burt Lancaster, is the routine, forgettable ``girlfriend'' - although she's such a Yuppie stereotype that the audience is relentlessly encouraged not to like her. Lindsay Crouse is the resident lady scientist - a smart woman who is one of the few who believes Sheen's theory. She's sure to meet up with a live scorpion. Young Tony T. Johnson is the kid Sheen befriends in a gee-whiz kind of unlikely friendship.
Sheen, in a flat top and goatee, looks pretty ridiculous, particularly when he's overly overly concerned about it all. He tries hard here to convince us that he is a serious actor. He doesn't, but the movie survives in spite of him.
The film is not likely to be major competition to the upcoming epic alien invasion ``Independence Day'' but, within its genre, it has its own kind of entertaining tension. It signals that the friendly atmosphere of ``Close Encounters of the Third Kind'' is over.
In the end, there's an ominous threat, straight out of the classic ``Day the Earth Stood Still'' that Earthlings had better shape up or they're going to overheat.
E.T. would find it false propaganda, but for fans of the genre, it's standard sci-fi with all the needed ingredients. ILLUSTRATION: ORION PICTURES
Charlie Sheen stars a radio astononmer on the trail of an alien
conspiracy to destroy the planet in "The Arrival."
"THE ARRIVAL"
Cast: Charlie Sheen, Teri Polo, Lindsay Crouse, Ron Silver, Richard
Schiff, Tony T. Johnson
Director: David Twohy
MPAA rating: PG-13 (adult language, sexual, situation, mild
violencce)
Mal's rating **1/2
Locations: Area theaters by CNB