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As horror-comedy films have become extremely popular over the last 10-15 years, you would think sci-fi comedy would come right along with it. Aside from a few stand-out films like Edgar Wright’s The World’s End, or Boots Riley’s Sorry to Bother You, that hasn’t really been the case. New Zealand filmmaker Shae Sterling has taken things in the right direction with his new feature film, Alien Addiction, releasing Tuesday, September 29th, 2020.
Alien Addiction follows Riko (Jimi Jackson), who unexpectedly meets two aliens that have crashed landed in the woods outside his small town. He immediately befriends the aliens and introduces them to the pleasures of Earth. While involved in these intergalactic shenanigans, an Alientologist is hell-bent on capturing the aliens and revealing them to the world.
The film starts off on a strong point by introducing our main character and his friends playing a game together. The chemistry right off the bat is fantastic. I’m a sucker for films that create strong bonds between friendships, and the these feel legitimate. The characters are laughing, smoking, and nerding out together. None of it feels like acting. It feels like we’re right in the room with them. This is a testament to working together and creating chemistry together as actors. It immediately reminded me of the type of connections seen in Attack the Block, although this is a far different type of film. Although Riko was the focus of the film, and provided hysterical slapstick comedy, the supporting actors all did fine jobs as well, adding silly content at every turn. The only character that I felt was a little out of place was the Alienologist, Peter Mackintosh (Thomas Sainsbury). Even for an over-the-top film, he felt a little too silly and I found myself wanting a little more malice in his character, like Jeffrey Combs from The Frighteners.
The camera work was beautifully done, offering fantastic New Zealand environmental shots. Sterling’s focuses and panning were all excellent, and the lighting was spot-on. All these things are important when creating well-done music videos, of which the director has done many. Absolutely zero complaints with the way this movie was filmed. It looked great. The props, makeup, and were all pleasing to the eye. The aliens’ looks were simple, but fun all the same. Personality was added to them by giving them big blue heads, tiny mouths, little chirpy voices and having them shuffle across the screen like penguins. This was even more hilarious when they were being chased by someone. The prop for their flying saucer was great as well. The only issues I had were a few moments of shoddy CG that I could have done without. That don’t really add or take away anything from the film.
The story itself (also written by Shae Sterling) was a fun take. Although the premise wasn’t entirely original, there were some humorous side plots that really set this story apart from others like it at its core. I’m kind of torn on the humor. On one hand, there was a lot of extremely funny situational humor and Letterkenny-esque dialogue interweaved with slapstick moments. On the other, I think the filmed leaned a little too hard on childish toilet (no pun intended) humor, like having the aliens get high from smoking human feces. Some of those moments were necessary for the plot but were ran into the ground a bit. It was a little confusing, because the jokes seemed like they were written for children or teens, but this is very much an R-rated film.
The ending was surprisingly kind of heartfelt for such a silly film, giving us some touching moments and closure between characters that had shown some adversity throughout the film. It was a nice addition and I thought it ended strong.
Overall, I’m extremely pleased with Sterling’s directorial debut. He showed a lot of technical experience and successfully carried it over into a genre mix that historically hasn’t produced that many strong films. The film wasn’t perfect by any means, but it was enjoyable, and that’s what matters to me. I’m extremely impressed for this being his first feature film, and I’m excited to see what he comes up with next, after seeing the success of this one. Alien Addiction has won several accolades, including Best Picture at the 2020 Florence Film Awards.
The film will be available On Demand, Blu-ray, and DVD on September 29, 2020.
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Feed My Coffee Addiction
