Escape From Planet Earth ***
Dir: Cal
Brunker. With the voices of: Brendan Fraser, Sarah Jessica Parker, Jessica
Alba. 89 mins. Cert: PG
This zippy, better-than-it-looks
multiplex filler counts as the first digimation to expose its audience of
snacking pre-teens to images of Stalin and Fidel Castro, part of an early
slideshow illustrating how men with facial hair have traditionally assumed
control of our planet. (It concludes with a shot of ZZ Top.) Visually, little
else distinguishes this tale of Blu-Tacky aliens attempting to rescue one of
their own from Area 51, here a holding bay for ETs whose out-of-this-world
inventions (smartphones, social networking) have been reappropriated by puny
Earthlings. Its secret weapon is a satirically inclined script, reworked by
Stephen Fry among others, which disrupts the general factory-line vibe with
regular funny lines: I liked one unexpectedly sharp “don’t ask, don’t tell” gag,
and the moment when our hero’s wife pulls on her anti-gravity boots to join the
mission, insisting “it’s not rocket science”, only to be met with an
exquisitely timed “That’s exactly what it is”.
Escape from Planet Earth is in cinemas nationwide.
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