Movie Review: Interstellar Wars

Interstellar Wars a.k.a Independence Wars: Insurgence a.k.a Star Trex Borders

Mc'Cohen Films, 848 Productions, USA, 2016.

In USA this film was marketed as "Independence Wars: Insurgence" and in Scandinavia this film was marketed as "Star Trex Borders." The reception in social media was hostile. Here the blaming finger points at the marketers at TomCat Films who turned an indie scifi into a mockbuster.

UFO appears on the sky near Los Angeles and emits strange light. Group of friends, soldierboy Kyle (Toby Maka), his girlfriend Kelly (director Marlene Mc'Cohen) and their lesbian friends Sara (Kinga Rosen) and Roxy (Genna Mc'Cohen), meet a crazy man (Art Roberts) in the desert. The light turns him into a zombie so Kyle punches him in the face.

Kelly & Kyle

Roxy and Sara

Desert man (Art Roberts)

Commander Bruce Kramer (Brian Lally) and his team of scientists try to repel the alien invasion. Bruce is also Kelly's and Sara's dad. About 15 minutes after the beginning of the invasion, L.A. is already fallen into anarchy. As the budget is low, here the anarchy means that a single robber tries to mug Kyle so Kyle punches him in the face. He's good at that.

UFO

Bruce Kramer and his team

Hot Zombie (Jennifer Churchich)

With the CGI-technology becoming affordable, acceptable looking space ships can be rendered even by indie filmmakers. The cast seems to consist mainly of amateurs, models or other indie filmmakers with Brian Lally and Robert Woods representing the experienced veteran actors. The level of acting is similar to Syfy or The Asylum (i.e. bad), so no Oscars for anyone. The usual low budget limitations are fully present, the streets are vacant, the sets are cheap and recording quality for speech goes from muffled to painfully loud. There is some nice scenery though, the picture is sharp and the editing looks professional.

Reporter Stacy Stoffer (Jenna Guercio) and alien  abductee (Veronica Ricci)

Analyst Joans (Kristen Hagen)

Leroy Jenkins! (Trey Carter) and Kyle

The story is the millionth iteration of the alien invasion genre, mostly imitating "Independence Day" but here and there it has some cheesy fun dialogue. It is futile to compare this to big budget scifi epics, as this looks like some friends and Mc'Cohen family members wanted to have fun and learn tricks of film making. Well everyone has to start somewhere and as a demo it could be worse. Let's hope the Mc'Cohens continue improving their skills and get better and more original scripts and more reasonable budgets to work with in the future.

The film has a character named Leroy Jenkins! He's similar reckless hothead as his namesake. It was quite random joke but it made me smile. For those who do not know the meme check this out:

Rating: unfair to rate

Starring: Brian Lally, Marlene Mc'Cohen, Robert Woods, Genna Mc'Cohen, Toby Maka, Kinga Rosen, Kyle Lally, Ginny You, Trey Carter, Veronica Ricci, Marie Barforough, Iris Brown, Richard Calderon, Jennifer Churchich, John Dobroth, Jim Freivogel, Jenna Guercio, Kristen Hagen, Georgie Halali, Alejandra Morin, Chris Pardal, Kathleen Randazzo, Art Roberts, Todd Stroik, Al Weigand 

Director: Marlene Mc'Cohen