webcrawler
Everyone looking for the film you can catch it on Starz Encore Drama. I get DirecTV so not sure which channel you might find it on cable, but Starz Encore is a good bet. Cute film. What is it about 80s film culture that makes you warm and fuzzy inside? Also, I remember the locations shot around Toronto, Canada. Very nostalgic because these places are much different now, and a few buildings and stores no longer exist. I believe this was a failed TV pilot. There are a few other Canadian based TV shows I have been searching for that were filmed around this time (early 80s). Night Heat, Friday the 13th, and War of Worlds.
Dejael
As one reviewer has commented, this film is worth watching just for the luscious, talented Belinda Bauer alone, as the alien, which is a standout; or for James Spader's excellent performance as Boston-Irish Joey Callahan. Both were at the beginning of their careers in the mid-1980s and this film is a highly artistic work which has everything going for it except a dismal special visual effects budget which reduces the credibility of the film, script, characters and actors exponentially.Jeff Bloom's script, direction, with acting, characters, costumes, makeup, performances, art direction, plus edgy electronic music score by Gil Melle are first-rate. With a bigger budget for scope and visual effects, this film could have succeeded as a theatrical feature. Unfortunately, its producers, Charles Fries Productions, cheaped out and made this a good little B-picture which is character-driven instead of effects-laden. Its style and substance make up for the almost nonexistent visual effects, which consist mainly of some early CGI animation which looks like 3-D CAD drawings, standing in for the alien spaceships which are only believable as nocturnal lights, especially at the end.This film was available on VHS videotape in the late 1980s directly from Fries Entertainment, but was discontinued sometime in the early 1990s. As far as I know it has never been reissued on video. The soundtrack score by Gil Melle is worthy of a CD release also.Highly recommended. A 7 out of 10.
courser-1
While I had no real problems with the storyline of this movie, I'm surprised that no other reviewer has mentioned the incredibly shoddy production values. Sound levels and quality fluctuate wildly - sometimes even in the same scene. The same is true for lighting and color saturation. It was extremely distracting. I might have rationalized that perhaps my local TV station just got a damaged print or something, until one scene cut was so bad it looked like Spader teleported from one spot to another. The angle and focus were terribly off and the cut was anything but seamless.I liked the emotional depth of this sort of dumb film, but the bad production values and quality control made it a nightmare to watch. Thankfully, I saw it on TV and didn't have to pay anything for it.
