Alien Trespass
Entry updated 13 July 2026. Tagged: Film.
US film (2009). Roadside Attractions. Directed by R W Goodwin. Written by Stephen P Fisher and Jim Swift. Cast includes Jenni Baird, Aaron Brooks, Andrew Dunbar, Dan Lauria, Eric McCormack, Jovan Nenadic, Robert Patrick, Sarah Smyth and Jody Thompson. 90 minutes; colour.
An introductory sequence states that this homage to sf films of the 1950s was actually filmed in 1957 (it was not), but it was long suppressed due to a legal dispute. In the main story, pipe-smoking astronomer Ted Lewis (McCormack) is with his wife Lana (Thompson) when he observes an apparent Meteorite landing nearby and goes to the site. He finds that it was actually a Spaceship carrying an Alien named Urp, who takes control of his body in order to track down the missing other occupant of his craft that he was overseeing, a dangerous Monster named Ghota (Nenadic) capable of eating people and dangerously reproducing. Urp cannot obtain assistance from the local authorities, police chief Dawson (Lauria) and policeman Vernon (Patrick), because they do not believe his story, but a waitress named Tammy (Baird) becomes his ally in his ultimately successful attempt to capture the monster; he is also aided by three teenagers – Cody (Brooks), Dick (Dunbar), and Penny (Smyth). Though Urp and Tammy develop feelings for each other, in the end, the alien must leave Earth with the monster, but Tammy is inspired by him to abandon her dead-end job and seek a better life elsewhere.
Most attempts to revisit the sf films of the 1950s involve big budgets, major stars, and dazzling special effects, but they are usually unmemorable, as shown by terrible remakes like Invaders from Mars (1986) and The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008). Yet Alien Trespass is a delightful exercise because it precisely replicates both the contents and the spirit of those films with its cast of unknowns, cheap special effects, use of a theremin, and gaudy Technicolor. At one point, Tammy defends Urp by making a passionate speech about the need to be attentive to our "big universe" and to welcome a "traveller from another world", a reminder that the sf films of the 1950s might have been minor productions but, in contrast to the prominent Hollywood films of the era, had major themes that still resonate today. The film's story recalls Hal Clement's novel Needle (May-June 1949 Astounding; exp 1950; vt From Outer Space 1957), but one also detects the influences of such 1950s films as the original The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), It Came from Outer Space (1953), Invasion of the Saucer Men (1957), and The Blob (1958). (Alien Trespass was provisionally titled It Came from Beyond Space.) And a boy in the film who loves sf has posters of Destination Moon (1950) and The Man from Planet X (1951) on his wall. This is a film that brilliantly honours the legacy of these films. [GW]
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