Aliens kidnapped my parents and now all I think is a long name and a lot of hearts

Aliens abducted my parents and now I think that from now on, I just watch Aliens abduct my parents - it's so easy to see a movie title like that - and my eyes roll up Huh. This is very ugly. (And that makes it really hard to write a title for that.) But it's also wonderfully fitting and a huge selling point about this movie. Director Jake Van Wagner's Alien Abducted My Parents, which premiered at this year's Sundance Film Festival, is a logical mashup of family-friendly fun and a coming-of-age story that does it right. Tries to do it. Does enough weird sci-file stuff to help break away from the otherwise formulaic story.

Ten years ago, a young Calvin (Jacob Buster) was trying to catch a glimpse of a comet on the roof with his father (Will Forte) when his life was forever changed, as both his parents died mysteriously. went. left out For the next decade, in the small Utah town of Pebble Falls, Calvin becomes obsessed with the idea that he was abducted by aliens, spending almost every second preparing himself for Hayking's return and his reappearance. This included learning everything he could about space travel, building his own cobbled-together astronomy equipment, and even taking a homemade spacesuit into orbit for testing. Fast forward to high school and, as you can imagine, he's not exactly the most popular guy.

As the Potters' return draws near, a new family moves from the big city to Pebble Falls, and temperamental teenage daughter Itsy (Emma Tremblay) is not happy about it. In an effort to fit in, he partners with a local cool kid on a journalism project to write about something weird in his hometown — who happens to be Calvin (who not only wears a spacesuit in public, but is) but also commits a non-distractable offense) dunk the Oreos in the ropes of the unbreakable).

Anyone over the age of 10 will be able to guess where the various Coke formulas are going in Aliens Abducted My Parents. They're the ones you've seen in countless family-friendly movies before. But here, being narrated creates a sense of comfort, in the same way that appears from investment in Steven Spielberg or Robert Zemeckis' '80s classic Rope. It works because of the chemistry between Buster and Tremblay and also because - as you can probably guess from the title - the movie isn't afraid to get weird. Goofy, questionable science, and generally pretty goofy humor. And as reported, it might get too real towards the end, with a gut punch that stands out in an otherwise mildly bleak picture. It also does a good job of keeping your big secret a secret by coming at the right time.

So what Aliens Abducted My Parents lacks in originality it mostly makes up for in heart, like a cover of an old song that's just Ford enough to make it interesting. It's also the rare modern live-action film that works for all audiences—comedy for kids and nostalgic and comforting for their parents.