Thursday, May 3, 2012

UFO's Are Real! (1979)


Director: Ed Hunt

Starring: Loonies

More info: IMDb

Tagline: We dare you not to believe after you've seen... UFO'S ARE REAL

Plot: One of many 1970s UFO documentaries, this one features lots of still photos of alleged UFOs, some UFO motion picture footage, and the usual stock footage and images acquired from government and military sources. Among the many people interviewed are UFO researchers Stanton Friedman and Ted Phillips, UFO abductees Betty Hill and Travis Walton, optical physicist Bruce Maccabee, and retired U.S. military officers Jesse Marcel and Wendelle Stevens. The documentary supports the view that alien visitors regularly come to Earth and have perhaps done so for centuries.



My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again? Nope. There's more where this came from so I just GOTSTA hit those.

I came across this while reviewing STARSHIP INVASIONS (1979) and looking up the credits of the director, Ed Hunt. Naturally, I was compelled to make this the next thing I watch.

I'm sure I've said this before here but I'll say it again; I'm about 100% sure we have no evidence that aliens have visited Earth. What people claim as evidence is either faked or it's something other than a flying saucer.


Wait. Maybe I'm wrong about this.



The film makers make hay about former President Jimmy Carter's sighting experience as well as many other notable politicians, pilots, astronauts, etc. Maybe there's something to this. Politicians can't be deceived or gullible, can they?


This woman, not to be confused by the actor Pat Roach who played the bald, burly guy Indy fights at the plane in RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (1981), is under hypnosis and she spills the beans on her encounter. Am I the only one here who is afraid the film makers put themselves in grave danger by interviewing a vampire??? My ass would've been on standby with a mallet and wooden stakes.



No, of course not. Whatever. Look, this is one of a gazillion documentaries of the 1970s that focused on all kinds of horseshit like Bigfoot, The Bermuda Triangle, UFOs, etc. They're generally fun and hokey as hell and I love them but you have to take these things with a grain of salt and apply some common sense and skepticism. They're a treasure trove of logical fallacies like the 'argument from authority' which states that a statement has more weight just because it came from someone important like the UFO sighting by President Carter. Just because he held the highest office in the country doesn't make his story any more plausible than that of Otis, the town drunk in THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW. Anyway, you can watch the whole thing for yourself on YouTube (above) and report back whether or not Ed Hunt and pals provide any smoking guns to the existence of aliens and their holiday plans to visit Earth.

Oh, and don't you just love the possessive use of the apostrophe in the film's title?

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