There’s something rather admirable about a shoestring-budget film modelled on an effects-packed blockbuster. Refusing to be held back by its considerable constraints (its $2.4m budget had to be crowdfunded), this sci-fi action comedy plays like a redo of last year’s Pixels but with much shoddier effects. The familiar plot has a group of smalltown folk tasked with saving the universe after a UFO crashes nearby, each of them in charge of a different piece of hi-tech equipment. While it gets an A for energy and enthusiasm, it gets precious little else. It’s a movie seemingly aimed at younger teens who, realistically, would find the film’s jarringly awful CGI a major distraction. Although one must give it credit for being just as predictable and unfunny as the big-budget films it so desperately wants to rub shoulders with.
