Verdict
Summary
Notorious for marketing itself as Alien 2 in Italy and abroad, Alien Terror is a very slow-moving exploitation feature full of stock footage, cut-and-paste scenes, and heavy exposition to explain its nearly nonsensical plot, but it’s something, if very conspicuous as a horror film relying on your familiarity for other, much-better films. The creature / monster effects are basically puppet-style movie magic involving icky looking slabs of intestines (probably real), lots of fake blood, and exploding prop heads. There’s a little bit of nudity, but not enough to go around, and yet somehow fans of these types of schlock Italian films might get their kicks from it.
Plot:
Alien organisms have landed on earth, and a team of spelunkers in a cave become infected.
Review:
A highly publicized space mission concludes when the astronauts return to earth, but along with them, some pulsating blue space rocks have hitched a ride. The rocks are dispersed along the coastline of California, and a clairvoyant author named Thelma (Belinda Mayne) goes on TV to talk about her premonitions about the event … which becomes awkward when she shuts down when a psychic vision disturbs her to the point of catatonia. Later, for respite, her boyfriend takes her on a spelunking trip to a cave on the coast with some friends, and while exploring the cave, the blue rocks show up and hatch, unleashing gooey alien tendrils that turn the explorers into gloppy victims! Thelma’s sixth sense doesn’t really come in handy at that point, though, as she fights to survive her way back out of the cave before becoming a flesh worm like the aliens in the blue rocks!
Notorious for marketing itself as Alien 2 in Italy and abroad, Alien Terror is a very slow-moving exploitation feature full of stock footage, cut-and-paste scenes, and heavy exposition to explain its nearly nonsensical plot, but it’s something, if very conspicuous as a horror film relying on your familiarity for other, much-better films. The creature / monster effects are basically puppet-style movie magic involving icky looking slabs of intestines (probably real), lots of fake blood, and exploding prop heads. There’s a little bit of nudity, but not enough to go around, and yet somehow fans of these types of schlock Italian films might get their kicks from it. Ciro Ippolito and Biagio Proietti directed this barely 84-minute fiasco.
Raro Video’s new Blu-ray release of Alien Terror (which is titled Alien 2 in the opening credits) comes in a high definition transfer (though the stock footage is still scratchy and grainy), with an audio commentary by some film historians, an interview with Eli Roth, and an English dubbed track, as well as the original Italian track with English subtitles.
