Super 8 (2011)

A group of geeky nerds (I think they're supposed to be in high school but they act like grammar school) are filming an amateur film late at night in the hopes of entering it into a contest. But they witness a horrible train wreck that unleashes a mysterious power that soon terrorizes the town. Of course, duh, the government knows all about it but is keeping them in the dark. Putrid about sums it up. It's the kind of cold, calculated soulless, cliche ridden CGI extravaganza that gives summer blockbusters a bad rep. Director J.J. Abrams is shameless! He piles on the sentimental twaddle like when boy bonds with girl (to Michael Giacchino's syrupy score) while they watch home movies of his dead mother, I kid you not! The ending is a shocking, near scene for scene, blatant rip-off of E.T. which sadly gives credence to the accusations that the film's co-producer Steven Spielberg might be a whoremonger after all! The film is a patchy, lazy piece of film making. One minute, the brats are in an underground cave trapped by a murderous alien, the next scene they're out of the cave and we're left to our own imagination as to how exactly they got out! Except for Elle Fanning, who has an actress's presence, the acting is abominable. The precocious brats here are Hollywood's idea of all American kids and bear no resemblance to the actual adolescent population. Loud and stupid and disgusting!