The Alien Factor (1978)

Director:  Don Dohler

Writer:  Don Dohler

Composer:  Ken Walker

Starring:  Don Leifert, Tom Griffith, Richard Dyszel, Richard Geiwitz, George Stover, Eleanor Herman, Anne Frith, Christopher Gummer

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  They brought terror from beyond our galaxy!

Plot:  A spaceship containing specimens for an intergalactic zoo crashes on Earth near a small back woods town. The specimens escape, and soon town folk are turning up mutilated.

My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

I like watching low/no budget movies made by people who are passionate about making them.  Don Dohler was a Baltimore filmmaker who started with this movie and made a few others (which I'll have to check out).  He also started Cinemagic Magazine in the early 70 and sold it to Starlog in '78.  I started reading it shortly after and still have a few of those early issues around here somewhere.  Neat-O.  For an ultra low budget movie, the story is simple at first but gets more intricate as the movie goes on and there's a lot of exposition at the end which made it even cooler.  I dig Ken Walker's electronic score.  Some scenes more than others but it's largely pretty cool and effective. The special effects run the spectrum.

There's even a stop motion animated creature at the end!  I LOVE that shit.  Anyone who includes stop motion animation in their pictures gets major points with me.  The acting is on the "gather everyone you know and put 'em in a movie" quality but there are some decent performances all things considered.  Some of the lines the sheriff had were great.  I'll have to add the sequel to my list.